A Pokemon Story
by frozenshadow56
Summary: A boy with amnesia in the world of pokemon, Hoenn specifically. His hidden past unfurls. His friendships are tested. His very ideas of real life are questioned. And then some fluff and morbidity for the fun of it. This is my first ever publication, so comments, questions, and critiques are all welcome.
1. Pilot

Author's note: This is my first story. I themed this ages ago, and want to finish it, but this will take quite some time. Just as a warning, this will be quite random, strange, and I also hope interesting. Do enjoy. Reviews are more than welcome, how positive or negative doesn't matter.

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I was unlike most kids with pokemon. Most of them got their starter as a present from their parents or friends. Some even bought their pokemon from breeders. Not me. All I got on my tenth birthday was a pokedex and a pokeball from Professor Birch in Littleroot Town. According to him, everyone should get a chance to travel and be with pokemon. That somehow, in the most unlikely way, stretched to a boy without a family like me. Like everyone else, Prof. Birch thought I had a family to help me get my first pokemon. The pokeball Birch gave was all I needed though. Even though I did not have a pokemon, there was one that I always had my sights on. If Birch had the right technology, I could finally revive the pokemon in the Old Amber around my neck, and give it the stone that I found alongside it.

Birch took my totem and said that he could send it to a fossil research lab, and promised to bring back my Aerodactyl as soon as possible. In the mean time, I should get some kind of pokemon while I can. I always had a knack for finding stones, and on my tenth birthday, not did I find a pokemon egg, but I also found another one of those curious stones alongside it.

I was alone the whole time. I knew that this egg must have been feeling the same thing. I kept it with me, and took good care of it. 'It will hatch soon,' I thought. 'this baby pokemon will have a family.'

Two days later, I found a pokeball on Prof. Birch's doorstep. Underneath it was a letter with my name on it. This was my Aerodactyl, my Aero. Once I was back with the egg, I called out Aero, and introduced myself. We played for hours. He held onto the stone I gave him, while I had a new totem around my neck, a smaller stone found while waiting for Aero to be mine. That was when the egg started to hatch.

The baby slowly whittled away at the shell, never stopping. It persevered through exhaustion and kept fighting till it could feel the sun of Littleroot Town on its head. The first thing to pop out was a little red horn, glowing gold. I could recognize this pokemon anywhere, the rare Ralts, a pokemon that I had never seen before. I had my first gift in my hand, wondering if I should catch this newborn. I didn't have to think after the baby gave me a hug. This pokemon was family. It belonged with me. I held out my pokeball, and it went into it. Ralts was mine. "Everyone in my family deserves a name." I said. "I'll call you ... Rall"

-.-.-.-

Disclaimer: I do not own the pokemon franchise, nor take any ownership of official pokemon franchise stuff. I'm just writing a story that is in the pokemon world. There may be characters that are based on pokemon franchise characters, but they are NOT the actual characters.


	2. A New Discovery

Rall and Aero both held the stones that I found them with. Each stone seemed to resonate with my totem, like there was unshared history between each of them. I could not tell. I was just happy that I had pokemon. The first person I would show them to would be the Professor.

I went into his office to find him tired. He brightened up the moment he saw me and my pokeballs. "I see that you have your Aerodactyl, and congratulations, but what is that other pokemon?" I called out both Aero and Rall, Each wearing a totem necklace with the stones I found them with. The Professor was happy to see that I had caught my first pokemon. He then assigned me with a task that all with pokedexes got, to complete the encyclopedia in my hands.

I owed the Professor too much to turn this task down. He gave me travelling supplies, which included a map, plenty of potions and berries, a town map, and a collapsable bicycle, and some shoes. This was more than I had ever had in my bag in my life put together. Thanking the kind benefactor, I set out onto Route 101 to capture all pokemon. I also had another goal. One that I have given myself for as long as I can remember. To become the Champion.

According to my pokedex, Aero was already at level 5, while Rall was at level 3. The pokemon around here were mainly Poochyenas, Zigzagoons, and Wurmples. I would first finish my former goal to become the strongest trainer in Hoenn, so Training was a must.

At every encounter, I would taunt enemies with the weaker Rall, then switch to Aero and defeat them a Rock Slide, Dragon Claw, or Bite. Once I got both of them to level 7, I used Rall more with Thunderbolt, Shadowball, and Confusion. Once I got to Oldale Town, I used Teleport whenever the two got weary. I then got challenged by my first Trainer.

I don't remember his name. I just remember that he had bug pokemon. This was a problem for Rall. Because of their pure bug typing, Rall's signature Confusion did less damage, and all damage taken by Rall was increased if the moves were bug type. Even after consistent Shadow Balls and dodging, Rall got too tired to be able to win. If I wanted him to benefit from the Battle, I had to switch him out. I returned Rall to his pokeball and sent out Aero, and noticed that Rall seemed angry. I would deal with that later. I had to win this battle. I just had to. Aero had no problem from the first few pokemon. They were both Wurmples, and both got swept away by his Wing Attack. The last pokemon brought out the weirdest and most amazing part. The trainer brought out a Cascoon, and repetitively used Harden to make my attacks useless. Aero couldn't do any damage. I was frustrated, and I could tell that Aero was feeling the same. That was when our totems started to glow.

Both of us felt a surge of energy. I then pressed against my totem, while Aero flew up high in the sky. I didn't care what I was doing, I just knew that I had to win. I had to help Aero and Rall get stronger. Letting out a great roar, Aero's totem lit up the brush of the route, engulfing him in light. When the light subsided, He was covered in obsidian-dark crystals, expanding the claws on his fingers and providing extra armor on his chest and head. I could hear his thoughts in my head then. 'We can win this, Trainer,' he said, his voice deep and powerful despite his usual high-pitched screaches. How he could hear me, I do not know, but that was probably how he could tell what I wanted. This new form of Aero's seemed to have allowed him to hear my thoughts the way I hear his. This way, we could actually communicate, and we could win.

The other trainer was then outclassed. He did not hear the telepathic conversation Aero and I were having, but he did see the Rock Slide Aero was making. Cascoon was told to use Harden, but missed Aero diving among the rocks. The Cascoon was then hit with multiple Wing Attacks, all of which were super effective, and boosted by Aero's Tough Claws. With that, my first pokemon battle against a trainer ended with a victory.


	3. An Old Gift

I made my way back to Littleroot Town to tell the Professor about what had happenned. Aero turned back to normal after the battle, and seemed to be unable to do so again without battling. Rall was frustrated that he could not do the same as Aero, and wanted to communicate in the same way that Aero had apparently described happenned during the battle. She wanted to be closer to me like her adopted older brother.

" Your Aerodactyl **evolved**! Aerodactyl can't evolve. They don't have any sort of evolutionary change that I can think of." "Well, that is apparently false, because Aero _did_ evolve." Birch and I were going back and forth like this for hours, not getting any closer to solving the mystery behing Aero's impossible transformation. We finally stopped when we heard a shrill voice in our heads telling us to "_Stop being so dumb! Just let Aero tell you what happened._"

Birch looked down at Rall's annoyed visage and put two and two together. "Young man," he said, "your Ralts has the rare ability called Telepathy. It can talk to you." "_I've been able to talk since I was born! Aero knows that, but Trainer doesn't._" "Hey, Rall, when you were born, you didn't make a single sound. Don't lie to me." My Rall called me 'Trainer', not by my name, which I told him, but a generic name for humans that had pokemon.

"Well son, your Ralts seems to have quite the temper, so I'll let you continue on." Birch promised that he would figure out the secret behind Aero's transformation, after collecting scans of all of our totems. That was it for the matter. As Birch would say, I continued on my merry way.

"Rall, I have a question." "_Shoot._" I found it funny how baby Rall was already talking a bit like me, although with some distinct differences. "You're a psychic type pokemon, and you have the ability to talk to humans through their minds," "_So?_" "So, can you help me to understand how pokemon talk?" Rall and Aero both looked at me, surprised. I guess the language barrier was really something my pokemon thought about. After a few more minutes of walking down Route 101 to Oldale town, Rall pulled on my leg, made me sit down, and nodded.

"_I'll use Confusion on you to make you go to sleep, and then fix your brain._" Rall was calm. Aero was watching us from the skies, acting as a guard so Rall and I could focus on the procedure. Rall closed her eyes, and right when I panicked and was about to ask about what could go wrong, I fell asleep.

"_Calm down Trainer. I won't look into any part of your brain but the language part_" Rall reassured, with a little hint of annoyance. She did some rummaging, and then said she was done. I thought that she would get out of my brain then, but she found something else. "What is it?" "_It feels like a memory block of some kind. Trainer, don't get scared, but you have amnesia._" Don't get scared, huh? Guess what I did. I woke up and freaked out.

I learned that Aero had a rather aged voice, despite being a young and healthy Aerodactyl. "_Calm yourself. Rall did what she said she would do and no more. Stop. Freaking. Out._" Sadly, I was still freaking out. "Rall, You could have done something in my head to make me go **crazy**! I could have become a senseless vegetable! I could have forgotten who you guys were! I could have-" "_That didn't happen. Now find a way for me to transform. I wanna be just like Aero... but not a dinosaur._" Rall held up her totem and dangled it in my face. "_The beard-man said that my stone was like Aero's, right? So I should be able to transform too._" "Well Rall, I can't quite tell. Aero can't evolve any more without his stone, while you can. Don't you want to be a Kirlia, and then a Gardevoir?" Rall turned away from me, dissappointed that I could not (or in her eyes, _would_ not) make her transform like Aero did. It did make a bit of sense though. Aero was officially my starter, and was supposed to be stronger than my other pokemon, including baby Rall. She caught up to him so fast though. I guess Aero needed a way to stay ahead of Rall. I guess Aero may have been afraid.

"_Trainer,_" Aero grunted, and pointed to the skies. The sun was already setting. I had been with my pokemon for only two days, and now Aero could do that tranforming thing in battle, Rall could talk in people's minds, and I could understand pokemon. We all had made some kind of achievement so quickly. To celebrate, I made dinner. My pokemon loved anything I ate, and I had found us some berries. Using my somehow-acquired cooking skills, Ralls Confusion, and some fire, I made us all berry kababs. I gave Aero his serving first, then a smaller portion for Rall, and then finally, a slightly larger portion for myself. Aero chomped off everything on the stick, chewed for a bit, and then spat out the stick, no berries included. Rall floated one berry at a time into her mouth, relishing each different flavor and loving the difference each had from pokemon food. I just ate and smiled.

We weren't going to make it to Oldale town before dark, so we just slept together. I lay on the ground, with Rall siddling up near my stomache, while Aero kept his warm underbelly to my back, draping Rall and I with his surprisingly warm wing. We said our goodnights, and I watched them sleep, noting that for the first time, not only were my pokemon sleeping out of their pokeballs, but also, for the first time in my amnesiac memory, I had said goodnight to those that I considered my family.


	4. Foreign Enemies

I could finally understand pokemon. I knew that there was something missing in my head, something that should have been there the whole time, but was lost with whatever repressed memories Rall had found within my mind. I could hear the voices of my pokemon, all pokemon, and they all could hear mine.

Rall and Aero loved that I could understand them. Now, anything that they wanted and needed could be communicated naturally, just like how i could already communicate with them. Oftentimes, Aero would want to try to fly with me and Rall on his back. While Aero was growing quite fast, he still wouldn't be able to handle Rall and I's weight (although he could easily take Rall on a ride be herself, but since she was still recently hatched, the height would scare her and make her cry. Her still-growing horn would have turned completely black from her fear, which is not a happy sight) . Aero would whine with a more silent varient of his usual high-pitched shrieks. Rall would just Teleport everywhere, begging me to catch her, like a Monferno on a sugar rush, and then just stop, Teleport into my arms, and make me sing her a lullaby, which Aero would contribute to with his high-pitched yet soothing shrieks. Rall was also still growing, and still needed to train a lot.

Training always was fun. Aero was the stronger one for sure, being newly revived rather than born, and sparred quite well with Rall. Rall would try to hit Aero with a small Shadow Ball or single Thunderbolt, while avoiding Aero's Wing Attacks and miniature Rock Slides. Of course, I managed all of it. Now that my pokemon and I could understand each other, I could make sure that each of them were safe, healthy, and happy. They did the same for me. They looked out for me, and I looked out for them. I had a family that I could remember.

We kept each others' backs even when we were faced with our first real enemy. While on Route 102, we decided to have a little fun near a pond. One of the few things that I could remember was how to swim, so I decided to try teaching Rall and Aero how to swim. I forgot one little detail though. 'I don't like water.' Aero was grunting and hovering over the pond. Aerodactyl are part Rock type, and Rock types are weak to water. Rall had no such type disadvantage. 'Teach me how to swim!' I had just gotten Rall to float in deaper waters when we were attacked.

Aero was shrieking, his primal and ancient instincts rising up as he plummetted to the ground. He crash landed, screeching the whole time. Rall Teleported us to him, and I returned him to his pokeball. Pokemon from another region had attacked us, one electric eel and one frog covered in vibrating nodes. I knew these pokemon, although I had no idea how. They were Electross and Seismitoad. They knew me. So did their trainer.

A man descended with a Hydreigon. A man with dark robes and long green hair like my own. His left eye was covered. He was looking at me. "At last. After five years, I have found you." I knew him. Ghetsis, the man in charge of Team Plasma. The man that tried to take over the world twice. The man who was supposed to be behind bars, serving time for his crimes against humanity and pokemon.

The man was standing right in front of me, with all three of his pokemon priming their attacks on me. All I had was Rall, who was too scared to Teleport away. Rall knew no moves that could knock out the opponents. Aero was too injured and weak to carry either of us. And I was completely useless, shivering with fear of this world-renown criminal.

"You gave me quite the slip," the criminal told me. I couldn't think rationally. I could just telepathically tell Rall to Teleport us out as soon as she could. Her horn was glowilng with a dark and murky purple. 'Aero is hurt, the mean pokemon and person are oozing evil, and you are scared. I need to get out of here too. I'll try.' Was all she said before she closed her eyes. "What's the matter, child? Don't remember me?" The criminal knew me. **Ghetsis** knew me. Could this be what my repressed memories had to do with?

I wouldn't figure out that day. The Hydreigon, Elektross, and Seismitoad were all hit with a heavy Body Slam from a gigantic sloth pokemon, and a man in a white jacket and clean-cut hair grabbed me and ran. He whispered something to Rall, and she finally got us out of there. I let Aero out of his ball, and my family of three promptly collapsed and fainted.


	5. The First Step

I woke up with Rall in my arms, Aero's wings wrapped around me, and on the floor of a dorm room. My pokemon were alright. I was alright. We were just in unknown territory.

I got up and checked my pokemon. Both were still asleep, but all of their wounds were fixed up. I noticed their pokeballs were resting atop a healing machine, just like one of the ones that are ever present in Pokemon Centers. This was clearly not a Center. The only places with these were Centers, Gyms, and homes of the rich. This wasn't a gold-plated room, so...

A man opened my room's door and walked in. He said nothing for quite a while. He wore a red jacket and black sweats. His dark hair was neatly cut into perfect symmetry. It took me some time to figure out who he was. The cleanliness, the massively powerful pokemon that could take on Ghetsis, the red jacket. He was Norman, the Petalburg Gym leader.

"You recognise me now. Good." He was completely detatched from what he was saying, eyes still on me. Why did he look at me like he did Ghetsis? "Do you have a name?" "I..." My mind was buzzing. This was _Norman_! One of the strongest Gym leaders! One of the people I would have to defeat to achieve my goal! "My name ..." "Save it. You've been knocked out for a full 2 days. It's about time you got yourself back together. The only thing that still requires fixing is your amnesia." "H-how did you know about that?" I usually don't talk to people, unless I really, _really_ have to. I don't just pass out my name blindly, let alone any medical status of mine. "Your Ralts. She told me. Well, not really. She accessed my mind to find a place to Teleport to, but I saw some of her memories. She saved all of our lives." Rall stirred. She was still asleep, but her horn glowed a soft and mellow green. Like new leaves on a tree. Like spring. She seemed to be saying, 'Norman can be trusted.'

"Now, you want to become the Champion, is that correct? Then you will need all of the Gym Badges, including my Balance Badge. However, on the normal circuit, you would go to Roxanne, up in Rustborough, and only get to me fifth." I knew what he meant. Most trainers that challenged him were well seasoned, strong, competent, and had 4 badges already. I was probably none of those yet. But I **needed** the badges. I **needed** to become Champion. I felt Aero and Rall wake up, both standing (in Aero's case, perching) next to me. 'We can take him.' Aero grunted. From the looks of Rall's horn, I could tell she was confident. I thought we could take Norman, I had levelled my team up quite well, and all of the wild pokemon we met were seriously weak. Rall was growing, and I could tell was close to evolving. Aero had finally grown to full size, and could carry both of us and more while flying. 'Should I challenge him?' My hands trembled. 'Should I challenge the strongest Gym leader in Hoenn?" I found my answer when Rall clutched onto my dirt-covered pantleg, and when Aero rested his head on my shoulder. "Norman," I made my hands into fists, shaking with excitement. "I challenge you."

The man looked at me, surprised. Of course, I had only two pokemon to challenge him with, but he would comply. Gym leaders accepted all worthy challenges. If he accepted mine, that would mean that I could finally take my first step towards becoming Champion, to achieve my goal. I remembered what that was now, or at least a part of it. To become my own person, on my own terms. I would not be molded again.

Then, after stretched out seconds, what felt like decades, I finally got my answer. "This will be interesting. Come with me."


	6. A New Form

l stood on one end of a Pokemon Stadium. Norman stood at the other. Am I ready for this? Can I take on Norman? There was no time for doubts. I needed to become champion. I needed to achieve on my own. And that had to start at the impossible.

The judge stood at the center of the stadium, reminding us of the ground rules. "This battle will be a Two-on-Two switch battle. The challenger may switch pokemon at any time, but the Gym Leader cannot switch out under normal conditions. There should not be any questions. Send out your first pokemon!" Norman sent out a Vigoroth, unable to hold back its excitement, feral look betraying its willingness to go all out. Who should I send out? Who should I-

'Trainer, send me out.' The femenine voice sounded odd with the steely tone. I called Rall out, poised for battle. She looked much bigger now, like she might evolve during this battle. She was also dancing around a bit, in slow and graceful pirouettes rather than rough thrashing. "**Battle**"

The Vigoroth charged forward, readying a Slash. One second passed and it would have hit Rall, but Rall set up the Telepathic connection with me beforehand and could literally read my mind. Just before she would have been hit, my Ralts did a pirouette backwards and hit the Vigoroth with a Thunderbolt.

Norman's pokemon was hurled into the opposing wall with the force. Norman looked in shock, then smiled. He was interested now. "Boy, if you are holding back any stops on me, now would be a bad time." "Oh, don't worry-" I was interrupted by a pulse of sunlight from Rall. She just smiled. This was finally happening. "I'm just getting started."

Another pulse of light, longer than the previous, and then a blinding glow. It was as if Volcarona decided to oberve the battle from close up. Then, the light ebbed away. As the black spots cleared, instead of a Ralts, my Rall now had perfect posture, her arms at ready in front of her, skirt almost parallel to the ground, feat continuously tapping. She looked down upon her new form, now the height of the formerly scary Vigoroth. Any inkling of doubt in both of our minds was gone.

Like with the Cascoon, her Telepathy allowed us to think in sync. 'I have a new power.' 'Just as I expected. Let's show him.' Rall's eyes glowed with a slight violet pink, and Vigoroth was pulled out of the wall. Rall and I both raised our arms, then dropped them. The Vigoroth's height was perfectly synchronized with our arms, ending up in a new hole in the ground. He had no bad physical injuries, but was knocked out cold. Norman withdrew his first pokemon with a large smile, and also decided not to hold back. He threw his pokeball upwards, and the Slaking that saved my life crashed down in front of us.

I immediately withdrew Rall. Even though evolution had healed her, the Vigoroth had snuck in about 3 Faint Attacks. No matter how hyped she was, Rall was close to fainting, and I didn't want to take any risks. She understood me. She could tell I knew that being cocky was never a good idea, and decided to follow my better judgement. I sent out my only other pokemon, my other starter. Aero took to the skies of the stadium, and let out a ferocious and stunning cry. Our two ferocious beasts would brawl.

Sorry if I haven't posted in a while, had a bit of writer's block and real life in the way. I'll try to make the next chapter as epic as possible (AEAP).


	7. One Step Closer

Neither of us had made a move with our pokemon yet. Aero took over the skies while the Slaking loafed around. Norman's powerhouse seemed to be completely unaware that it was in battle. He just stared off into space, at nothing in particular. Aero and I were hyped, and Norman was beginning to get excited, but even when Aero let out his high-pitched cry, the Slaking didn't even blink.

'Trainer, we shouldn't take any risks here. If what you said about the Gym Leaders is true, then this pokemon is that human's strongest one.' "Let's be careful Aero." "Oh, _now_ you want to be careful. Don't doubt your pokemon, but do know their limits. Very good." With that, Norman threw of his red jacket, his body covered in sweat. I looked down to see that I was also perspiring. "Slaking, Faint Attack." The Slaking stood up from its resting position, taller than I expected, and somehow hit Aero with it. Aero came crashing down to the ground in front of me, leaving yet another crater in the gym. I hoped that I wouldn't have to pay for the expenses. I didn't have that much money.

If what I knew of Slaking was correct, he would slack off the next turn. Aero was close to fainting. This would be our only chance. 'I cannot last much longer.' "I know that Aero! We need to do the thing." Aero would not be able to take on Slaking the way he is, but in his evolved form, he might have a chance. With the data I've been putting in the Pokedex, Aero's evolved form would be stronger and more durable. But it could only be used once per battle. We only had one shot.

What do I have to lose? I didn't have much money, and by Trainer rules, I would give half upon losing. Rall and Aero would need to go to a Pokemon Center right after, no matter the outcome, and that was always free. If I could get lodging, I'd be able to get us all free food as well. Hotels were always out of the question. We'd train more, get stronger, and challenge Norman again. But I wasn't willing to do that.

Aero flew up just below the ceiling, hovering as our totems began to glow. Like with Rall, the room was again engulfed in light, and Aero's obsidified form hovered in the regular Aerodactyl's place. 'I am in your mind now, Trainer.' 'And I'm in yours.' Norman had one second of surprise, and then grinned. I was a good opponent, and I had many surprises. His Slaking just slacked off as Aero's Toughened Claws made his Dragon Claw attack hit harder than normal, and kept its blank stare when Aero bit into its shoulder. "Shake him off and use Yawn!" Slaking slapped Aero off of itself, ate a Sitrus berry, and Yawned in Aero's direction. My gigantic, sky-dominating dinosaur of a pokemon was getting sleepy. 'I can go fast and hit him, but I'll fall asleep. What should I do?' What should I tell him? Should I return him and let Rall faint? Should I keep going and risk losing Aero? What should I do? What should I do? What should -

Wait. That Slaking ate its Sitrus berry. That means that Aero's bite and Dragon Claw got it close to fainting. Aero could win. I could win. My team could win.

'Do the same thing as before, but start with Bite.' 'Yes Trainer.' With a cry that held the strength of the ancient pokemon behind it, Aero dove down and Bit into Slaking's already bitten shoulder. Keeping a tight grip on the enemy, Aero flailed Dragon Claw's onto Slaking, getting slower as he got sleepier. I willed him to stay awake, but he was fading fast. Slaking was beginning to move again, looking at his shoulder in annoyance. Aero clawed at Slaking's chest, his back, and finally Bit into its shoulder again before falling asleep. The Slaking looked unfazed at Aero. "Now, Slaking, Counter." Slaking's eyes focused. He raised his fist to attack, then fell backwards to face his trainer. It was knocked out cold.

Norman walked up to me, picking me up. I hadn't realized that I was lying on the floor. I called Rall out, and she clung onto me. Carrying her in my arm, I crawled over to Aero and held him with my other arm. A glow surrounded us, and Aero was a normal Aerodactyl again. We all murmured just above a whisper. 'We won.' 'I can dance better now' "I didn't know you danced in the first place." 'I do, and I can dance better now. Aero did the impossible thing again, right?' 'Yes I did, and Trainer helped me. I cannot do it without him.' " I couldn't do much without you guys. I couldn't beat Norman without you guys. Thank you." Rall patted my shoulder, and I looked down to see tears flowing down her eyes. Aero's eyes were also wet, and I was on the verge of bawling. That was when Norman gripped my shoulder and held out his hand. "Congratulations challenger." He said. In his hand was the Boulder Badge. My first Badge.

"Come on out guys." We were lucky enough to get lodging in the Pokemon Center. I got us all food, and decided to eat with my pokemon. We all munched on our food, Aero and Rall sampling some of my pizza. I was vegetarian, I didn't like eating pokemon, but I did like eating delicious foods. This included regular pizza. Aero and Rall quickly finished their respective chomped Magicarp cutlets and levitated Pokemon food, and due to exhaustion, risked trying human food. Of course they loved it. It's pizza. We were about to order another whole pizza to share when my door openned.


	8. Some Brother

'Brother! What happenned? Why can't you-' the little red ball of a pokemon in my arms began to bawl, its tiny paws holding a surprisingly strong grip.

Allow me to provide some context. My door had just opened when I was tackled by a fast moving red ball of fur. Upon closer inspection, I found it had eyes, short little limbs, and an almost permanent smile. I was tackled onto my bed and needed Rall to bombard the little thing with Shadow Balls to get it to tire out. It looked slightly hurt, but happy nonetheless. I went back to Nurse Joy to get it healed, then took it back into my room, gave it a slice of_ really_ spicy pizza, and began the interrogation.

He (his voice was high-pitched but male) kept calling me 'Brother' so I had to ask how it knew me. 'You don't remember me? But we are brothers! We were raised together! We both confronted that mean old m-' "Sorry to interrupt, but I believe that is my Darumaka." A guy was standing at the door, pokeball at the ready. So the little fiery-eyebrowed one was a Darumaka. A Unovan pokemon, like Seismitoad and Hydreigon and Electross.

'No, I'm _this_ human's.' the Darumaka gestured to me. By then I could recognize it from the Pokedex. Darumaka had an internal flame, and only rested when it burned below a certain temperature. That make the little perma-smile, fire-browed pokemon a handful. "So, you must be this Darumaka's brother then." the trainer seemed to be able to understand pokemon. That came as a shock. I thought only I could hear a pokemon's voice.

"If you really are this little one's trainer, then you must be ... wait, I should introduce myself. I'm Hades. I'm a travelling trainer." With that, he came into my borrowed room and made it stuffy by releasing his other five pokemon. "Meet Bhoomi, Kwai, Yue'Liang, Rohit, and Shyaam. My team minus a member to help out this little Dharma." In order (with some help from the Pokedex), his team had an Aegislash, Ninjask, Milotic, Tyranitar, Galvantula, and a mystery pokemon. Also, my 'brother' was named Dharma. All five of his pokemon loved Hades, and even said so, all while snuggling up to him and conversing with Aero and Rall and Dharma in the cramped up room we had. To make things even more comfortable, the Tyranitar's breath made a bit of a Sandstorm. 'Sorry, I can't help it.' was all he could say before he was returned. Now the pizza had sand on it, although Aero was the only one who didn't mind. Rall stole two slices from him and Psychically removed the sand before sharing with Dharma. No harm done, just a destroyed map and phone that I _really_ needed.

"Ah, my bad. Rohit can't really help it. It's how many Tyranitar are. Anyways, Dharma came to me in Unova to find his 'brother', you. He trusted me because I could understand him like you apparently do." How could he understand pokemon? I thought only I could. "To answer the question I think you have," he pretty much read my mind here "I'm from the Viridian Forest in Kanto. People there seem to be able to look into the memories and hear the voices of Pokemon."

That shocked me a bit (that and earlier his Galvantula was setting up an electric web that I _happenned_ to step on). "So you are who you say you are. My name -" "Yeah, yeah, Dharma told me already. Anyways, what brings a Unovan out to Petalburg, Hoenn? I don't see many participating in the Hoenn League." "Oh" I was from Unova. I was from somewhere. "Funny thing you should ask. You see ..." Rall decided this was a good time to chime in as my 'brain doctor'. 'Trainer has Amnesia.'

Hades was shocked, but Dharma began bawling. This is where we are caught up. Dharma was soaking my one clean shirt, Aero was bored into sleeping, and Rall was my doctor/therapist, while Hades was made an acquaintance. He seemed exhausted from dealing with the endlessly energized Dharma today (let alone the five years he was searching for me. I was missing for **five years!**), so he just bunked in my room. Both of us kept our teams in their pokeballs, while I dreamed about a past I could not remember.

Author's note: If you are wondering about the naming for the new character, Hades is my pokemon game most-used handle. That is all.


	9. Pretty Nice System, and I'm Out

That is how I got my third pokemon, Dharma the Darumaka. That is also how I met Hades, a travelling trainer with a team of six pokemon. His sixth pokemon turned out to be a Shedninja he called Maan. It didn't seem to do much, but made sure to always face the group when it was out. I soon learned why.

"So, what do you do?" I had no idea what Hades did. He said he travelled, but I didn't know much past that.

"Oh, I try to become champion in whatever region I go to."

"So you're a **Champion**?"

"Heck nah! If I was a Champion, I would be stuck in the region I became Champion in. I'm travelling around, making my team better, and trying to find the perfect place."

"So you haven't just been having trouble taking on Champions?"

"That too."

Hades then told me about how his journey started out. Apparently, his father was a travelling businessman, who often went to other regions. This is how a Kanto trainer like Hades ended up starting out with a Honedge for his journey. It was also how he learned to fight.

"When Bhoomi would wrap her scarf on my arm, She would sap energy from me to feed herself, but also taught me to fight in the process. She's a living sword, so she knows a lot about combat."

A living weapon? That's what many pokemon were described as by criminal organizations, but Bhoomi was a literally living sword and shield. It made sense.

"Why don't you figure out who you were already?" I apparently stopped paying attention, so he had to resort to some deeply personal question. Of course he had to ask about something I could not fathom.

"Well..."

"Did you have some kind of abusive parent?"

"I-"

"Were you a criminal"

"Let me f-"

"Did you try offing yourself?"

"**I don't know**!" That kept him shut up for long enough to let me breath.

"I mean, I'd rather let my memories come back with time. Just because I have Rall doesn't mean that I have to figure out who I was. Those memories of mine were probably repressed for a reason. If they come back, that means that whoever I was accepts those memories now. Just-"

"Okay I get it. I'll let it be. But I have to train a new team at some point."

"Wait, you have multiple teams?"

"Of course I do. I'v been to multiple regions. I have plenty of pokemon. I just need to train them pretty hard."

With that, he showed me the Pokemon Storage System. He stored his Milotic, Shedninja, Ninjask, Tyranitar, and Galvantula to train his Carracosta, Heliolisk, Houndoom, Mamoswine, and Tropius. From what I saw of his pokemon, he really had travelled the world before trying to become a champion.

"So where do the pokemon you aren't using go?"

"I have it set so that they go to a house mom and lil' brother are staying at. That way, my pokemon won't be bored, they'll be taken care of, and bro can learn more about pokemon."

"You have a little brother?"

"Yeah, Venkatesh. He's gonna start training soon, so I thought the more time he spends around trained or just-caught pokemon, the better. Heck, his starter could be one of the my untrained pokemon."

Thoughts rushed through my mind at that point. Old me thoughts. Thoughts of a former king, on a misguided crusade. I used to think pokemon should be freed from human control to be truly equal. I used to think that all pokemon were pained by being trapped in pokeballs. I used to be completely pained by the thought of pokemon as mere presents, pets, or weapons.

I used to think like Ghetsis.

I saw his face in my head, and then looked up to see Hades and Rall shaking me. "Wake up, man! **Wake UP!**" Aero was screeching in fear, Dharma kept jumping on my legs to avoid crying, and Rall's eyes were glowing pink with Psychic. I looked at her, and she could tell I didn't need help anymore. Rall's horns were glowing black again. I wished that wouldn't have to happen again. I sat up (noticing I was lying down on the ground. Had I fainted?) and was immediately tackled back to the ground by my own little brother. He clung onto my shirt and began crying again, completely dirtying my first clean shirt in weeks. Then Rall jumped and hugged me, her horns glowing a deep blue, tears streaming as bad as Dharma's. Then Aero wrapped his wings around me, and I surprisingly found him crying as well. They must have thought I would have died then. With their combined weight, I was close.

Hades helped pull me out of what would have been my grave and explained. "You were out for five minutes. Rall looked in your mind to make sure you were okay, and then got really scared by the face you saw. She didn't describe it to me. You know the rest."

Two days later, after checking with Nurse Joy and Rall to make sure that I wouldn't suddenly faint again, Hades decided to help me on my journey. He said it was to make sure his new team could hold their own in a battle, but I knew (a little Kirlia told me … Ow! Okay, a grown up Kirlia told me) that it was mainly because I reminded him of Venkatesh.


	10. Alone Again, Naturally

We were going to Rustborough City now, Hades and I. But in order to get there, we had to go through a forest. We were quite the distance from Petalburg, and he decided that they all had enough training for the day. We were arguing about what to do next.

"Let's get some rest back at the Pokemon Center. We won't have to face that much hassle then."

"No, we should Fly to Rustborough. Your Aerodactyl and my Tropius could easily carry us if we returned our pokemon."

"But there is so much training we could do in the forest! Why skip it when I could need it against Roxanne?"

"You've already beat _Norman_! How are you not ready?"

"Dharma and Aero both have weaknesses to her, and I can't be expected to put all the pressure on Rall! She's still really young!"

At this, Rall got quite pissed. It became obvious when Rall Psychically shut both of our mouths. 'Trainer and other Trainer, just _shut up_.' She also showed what argument she supported when she pulled all of us, including hulks like Hasti the Mamoswine and Kurma the Carracosta, into a hand-holding chain and Teleported us all back to Petalburg. 'All of us are tired, and we're already here, so let's rest.' Rall really wasn't a baby anymore. She was our mom.

-.-.-.-

I woke up in the morning with Rall curled protectively next to me, Dharma dozed off on me, and Aero draping his wings aroung all of us. This would be how we normally woke up, with a few changes. I also found that Hades was packing.

"Where are you going?" was what I meant to say. Since it was morning, I probably said "whey arryoogoyeeeeeeee?"

Luckily, Hades spoke groggy Trainer.

"I lied to you a bit. I said that I have faced Champions. In truth, I always got lost in Victory Road. Not this time. I've decided to challenge the Elite Four, and maybe become Champion of Hoenn. This time, no cave will hold me back."

That woke me up. It also made me roll Dharma off my chest. I caught him before he could crash. I only made one takeaway then. My one human friend was leaving. Emphasis on human as I could talk to him without others thinking I was crazy.

I understood, though. He had plenty of training for his pokemon. He just needed to test them, see if they could carry him to Championship. I would have done something slightly along those lines. Then the Old King in me shouted, '_He's a hypocrite, just like Alder! He's just going to do nothing! All Champions do is *_nothing*_!_' but the Old King wasn't me. Not anymore. So I could easily disregard his close-minded views. "Make sure you call." was all I could say without giving him a big, sappy, un-manly hug (I was only 15!).

With that, he tossed me a round device. "My Pokenav contact info is in here. Consider it a token of our friendship." He smiled at me, at my team, my family, and gave a final wave. His final words before leaving were, "Tell mom I said bye."

-.-.-.-

My pokemon woke up, and after acting slightly hurt from Hades leaving, decided we should have a late breakfast. Since the kitchen to the Pokemon Center was closed, there wasn't any food available. However, Nurse Joy did drop a hint. "We have no cooks willing to make food right now." I then found everyone on my team a chef's hat.

We did pretty nicely. Rall read the minds of nearby Chansey and Audino to get recipes and pick ingredients. Dharma lit the fires and heated ingredients per her instructions. Aero had some trouble finding what to do, so he decided cutting with his wings and crushing with his claws would suffice for ingredient preparation. I simply helped them do whatever they were doing. We dirtied the kitchen plenty, so after eating, Nurse Joy made absolutely sure that we cleaned up our mess. Needless to say, it was harder than making it.

In short, my first friend in my species left to become what I was aspiring to be, while the old, forgotten me developed a deep-seated hatred for him. The status quo among my pokemon was shifting, with Dharma acting as my brother, Aero as the wise, ancient muscle, and Rall as the mom. That last change will not in any way falter.


	11. Quite a Crush

Author's Note: Sorry if I have not been posting for a while. I have been doing a cram course to get further into math crap. Do NOT do any sort of cram course. It hurts your head. That is all.

-.-.-.-

Aero, Rall, Dharma, and me. A prehistoric dinosaur, a dancer with maternal tendencies, and an energetic, smiling ball of red fluff as a brother. I would need all of them and more if I wanted to be champion. But they need training. That is where the Petalburg Forest comes in. Hades wanted to skip over it, but my team needed to train more. My team still needs to train more. That forest full of pokemon could help my somehow weaker Dharma get stronger, and maybe even evolve. He didn't get much training from Hades, as he was looking for me, but now he was seriously below-par when compared to Rall and Aero. The forest was for him more than anyone.

We had just taken out a horde of Wurmple (Thank Arceus that Rollout is a move) when we came across a trainer battle. There was a girl fighting an older guy. The girl was probably my age, around 15, but the guy was around his early twenties. The man was using a Sawk, which was an interesting Unova fighting type, but what really caught my eye was the Patrat the girl was using. Not only did it really, and I mean _really_ like its trainer, but it had darker fur than a normal Patrat, and had blue and green eyes.

The different colors did not apply at all to the Patrat's combat abilities. The Sawk was demolishing her (the Patrat was female. I hear pokemon voices remember?) with Double Kicks and Counters, and it's a wonder how the Patrat could still fight. The girl looked in trouble, and looked genuinely sad. What did I do, you ask? I walked next to her and helped her out.

No I did not take over the battle for her. That would be disrespectful and rude, plus the Old King might have butted in. What I did was give her advice.

"Try blinding him."

"Who are you?" the girl said.

"Just try it."

She looked daggers at me. After seeing that I wasn't joking, she gave the command.

"Cuddles, Sand Attack."

Cuddles the oddly colored Patrat did as she was told, and kicked sand up into the Sawk's eyes. As I expected, and to both trainers' surprise, Sawk couldn't hit any attacks on Cuddles anymore. None.

"Now put him to sleep."

This time, there was no hesitation. "Cuddles, Hypnosis!"

-.-.-.-

In this way, I helped the girl and Cuddles win an uphill battle. The older trainer gave us half his cash, which was quite a sizable amount, and left. That left me and the girl alone with our pokemon. Me and a girl. I went from being with my pokemon family to having and losing a human friend, and now to being alone in a forest with a girl. Who knew?

"Thanks."

"What for?" I was a nice person, and usually would have just said you're welcome and left, but I wanted to talk to this girl. I wanted to get to know her.

She sighed, stood straight up (crap, she's taller than me), and after a moment said, "Thank you for helping me win my battle."

"No problem. You looked like you could use the help."

"What does that mean?" Great, now I pissed her off.

"Oh, nothing. Sorry. Forget I said anything." 

"You think I'm weak? You think I can't fight for myself? I'll show you!"

I tried to stop her, but she kept going on, and then decided to challenge me. Now I have to fight the first person I tried to make friends with. Just super.

But first, she brought out her pokemon and healed them. I had no items, and only had Dharma out, so I nicely asked her to heal him for me. At least she knew a broke kid when she saw one, and was quite generous. "I'm Michelle, by the way. Just telling you the name of the trainer that will wipe the floor with you."

"Really? Well, I'm –"

"Save it. You can tell me your name after I beat you."

Well she was nice. I decided that Dharma should be enough to beat her team of three. My little brother was ecstatic. I just held a face of dread.

Dharma stood in front of me. Michelle sent out another oddly colored pokemon, this time a Wurmple with purple skin instead of pinkish-red. "Dana, let's not hold back." She had Cuddles the Patrat and Dana the Wurmple. How cute. Man did I like this girl.

Michelle didn't make any moves after that, so I took the liberty of having the first attack. "Dharma, Fire Fang."

Dharma rolled up around Dana, circling around her a few times like we practiced on wild pokemon. This had the desired effect, duking out Dana, and getting her bitten in the belly. Dana was knocked out cold, and Michelle switched her out for another oddly colored pokemon, this time a Kalos pokemon under the new type classification, a Flabebe. This one no different color schemes that I could see, but held a blue flower. This time, I let Michelle attack first (Yes, I can be a gentleman).

"Aroma, use Fairy Wind!"

The Flabebe pointed its flower like a cannon and shot out the Fairy Wind. Dharma had already faced plenty of Poison Stings and String Shots to know how to dodge, and rolled away like a Growlithe using Extreme Speed. "Headbutt" was all I had to say for Dharma to leap out of his roll and smash his head into Aroma's body. She was knocked out too.

Right then, Michelle looked on the verge of tears. I could tell she really wasn't that good at battling. But I did like her, and wanted her to like me. So I made a choice that many trainers would regret and appreciate at the same time.

"We can stop now. You won't have to give me any of your money. Let's just stop now."

She didn't say anything. She just nodded, sniffled a bit, and healed her pokemon. I returned Dharma and tried to leave, but she grabbed my hand. She wanted me to stay. I guess I could get her to like me after demolishing her team.


	12. So Much Love Just the Family Kind

Author's Note: School has started for me. Yay, Junior year. I won't be able to post much for the next 180+ days, but I will do my best. That is all. Enjoy more pokemon stuff.

-.-.-.-.-

We did not talk after our one-sided battle. I did not know why she kept following me, but took the opportunity to get to know her.

"So … How long have you been training?"

"…" Crap, personal questions right off the bat aren't that good of an idea. Just when I was about to tell I didn't mean to pry, she responded,

"About a month."

"Really? How old are you?"

"Can you keep a secret?"

Honestly, I have no memory of doing any such thing. But I'll try. "Sure."

"I'm fifteen."

She really was my age. "Awesome. Me too." 

"Really? But you're so tiny! I mean, I thought you were ten or twelve or something."

"No, really, look at my Trainer's License."

I showed her my License, and she saw that I was in fact about her age. What really shocked her was when I started training.

"You only started training two weeks after me! How are you so strong?"

"I beat Norman."

Michelle would have said more, but just about then, we got through the Petalburgh Woods. Before us stood two younger twin girls.

"Hey, you!" 

"Tall lady and pony tail guy!"

Why did everyone hate on the pony tail? Why can't guys have pony tails?

Michelle was first to speak, as I was too busy being self-conscious about the tail. "What do you pipsqueaks want?"

"We're trainers, and we challenge you two to a double battle!" 

"Shit," Michelle looked panicked. She then whispered to me, "I don't know how to double battle."

"You sit back. Your pokemon are tired too. Just leave this to me." Unlike my unsuspecting crush, I knew how to double battle. I also had two pokemon that did not need forest training I could use.

"Two against one? You are-"

"Making this too easy for us."

I found it creepy how the twins finished each other's sentences. They were identical twins, but didn't have to make me feel scared about it. Maybe this was to cover up for their terrible battle skills. They looked like they just got their trainer's licenses.

"You probably think we're weak, but we already have our first badges …"

"So prepare to give us your money!"

They each sent out their pokemon, perfectly synchronized. They only had a Mudkip and a Beautifly. I decided no mercy would be a good approach. I also decided now would be a good time to test out some of the combos I taught my pokemon.

"Aero, Rock Slide! Rall, use Thunderbolt!" 

"Daisy dodge!"

"You too, Mara!"

One reason that I love my pokemon: they have impeccable aim and learn fast. The Mudkip dodged the rocks successfully, but got knocked out by the Thunderbolt. The Beautifly wasn't so lucky. When trying to maneuver away, it got slapped back into the rocks by Aero's wings. In one turn, I won a battle.

"No fair!"

"You cheated!"

Of course kids would think I cheated. I was just better than them. The twins started to cry, and Michelle comforted them. She really knew how to make people feel better, and how to make me like her even more. Pretty soon, they gave us some berries as a thank you (for the lesson that there were others better than them and for being nice), and we were on our way. I decided to pry a little more into the girl of my dreams.

"So, have any family?"

At that, she started crying. Why did I always make girls cry?

"Oh, sorry. It's just *sob*, my dad died a bit back. He gave me all his inheritance, and is the reason I have the pokemon I have now. See, he ran an international company, and got me rare pokemon from each region. He loved me. But he's gone. I started my journey by getting my license the day after he died. I want to become my own person. *sob* I want… I want to be Champion."

Aaaand, my crush was my competition. Still, I would help her. Anyone collecting badges had to be a candidate for Championship. Just about every trainer in every region was collecting badges. It was to be expected. I just had to beat her to Championship.

-.-.-.-.-

We arrived at the Rustborough City Pokemon Center, and got the last two neighboring rooms. I said good night to Michelle, and had a team meeting before bed.

"So, what do you think of Michelle?"

'The dark haired female with hair shorter than yours?"

"Aero, why do you hate the pony tail? I don't cut my hair. It helps me connect to nature."

'It makes you look like a female.'

'Aero, Trainer, enough with the hair tail.' Rall interjected. 'No more talking about the Ponyta tail.'

'Brother has a Ponyta tail?'

"**Shut UP!"** That got everybody's attention, although Dharma was starting to sniffle. I wrapped him in a hug and continued. "Really, what do you think of her? I kinda like her, and want to know what my family thinks."

"So I am your brother?" Dharma looked up at me hopefully.

"Yes, Dharma, you are my brother. And Aero is our papa. And Rall is our mom." My dinosaur and ballerina looked at me and smiled. They could try ordering me around now. As if my life needed to be more confusing. Luckily, they got back on topic.

'I like her. She seems to like you too.' "Did you see her crying and holding my hand? 'Cuz that doesn't count." Of course Aero would see that miscommunication as real emotions. He turns out to be a real romantic.

'I just want brother to be happy. If this girly makes you happy, then I like her.' "Thanks, Dharma."

'I don't like her.'

"Why not, Rall?"

'She gets angry very easily, and has a sad past. When we were around her, she would either be angry or sad. I don't want you to turn the same way.' Rall just proved she was my mom.

"Well Rall, think of it this way. She doesn't really treat her pokemon like family, but I do. What I want to do is make her happy, and hopefully help her join our family. Her pokemon too." Of course I would say that. I want people and pokemon to be happy, so I don't want to leave her's out of my picture.

'We'll see, kiddo. Now let's all just sleep.'

We got into our sleeping pile and said our good nights. Aero and Rall now called me kiddo, but still had some respect for me. Dharma still called me brother. I was bitten by a love bug named Michelle, who had a sad past and stored up anger. I thought to myself, I'll deal with all of these in the morning.


	13. A Deal with the Nameless

Author's note: first story in a while. I apologize for not publishing in a while. Please forgive. Also do review if you can. Any and all comments/critiques are welcome. Thanks

-.-.-.-.-.-

Have I mentioned how beautiful Hoenn is? Every turn, there is nature. Trees filled with berries. Lush green forests. Deep blue waters. Air with no pollutants. Mountains that rise and caress the sky. And the pokemon! They are in the trees, in the water, in the sky, on the mountains, _everywhere_! The best part? They are all happy, along with the people. Pokemon and people live in relative harmony.

Somehow, my image of people and pokemon living together is one more filled with blood and gore, bathed in the light of fire and the ashes of the fallen, filled with the cries of children of both types. Somehow, the old, Nameless me never new about a place as magnificent as Hoenn.

"… Helloooooo? Are you even listening? I'm **trying** to talk to you about something important." Michelle was using her "Give me your Attention or die" tone. We barely knew each other, but we were basically best friends. So this is the friend zone.

"Your sass is showing." I stated. At this, she just looked enraged, would take a swing at me, and then would almost be on the verge of embarrassment. She would look down and her cheeks would get red every single time. About 50% of the time. Every time. And not a single apology. You'd think she would owe me after helping her get the Stone Badge, and then for navigating her back through the Petalburg Forest, but nope, nothing in return. Nothing at all.

We were on the way to a Mr. Briney's cabin. Apparently he could shuttle us to Dewford Town, since neither of us had pokemon that could swim, and Aero still couldn't support two people yet. Just imagining flying with her and Aero got me drooling a little too much, so I had the Nameless me deal with that. He could try to figure out what emotions were while I tried to complete my goal.

Dewford was the ideal next stop, because both of us have fairy-type pokemon, her Flabebe and Rall, who doubles as a psychic-type. I also have Aero, who could wipe the floor with the fighting-type's using his flying-type skills, and Dharma was straight-up strong. The real problem Michelle would have manifested in Cuddles and Dana, neither of who had any distinct type or move advantages. I could try to help teach Counter to Cuddles, and Dana would evolve soon so she could learn Harden, but Brawly has a lot of redirectional strength in his art of Ju. He and Kanto's Fighting Elite-Four mastered the Martial Arts of Ju and Go, stuff I'd been trying to do, but couldn't. Why was that? Anyways, Due to new pokemon discoveries, Brawly would probably have a Hawlucha and a Throh for sturdiness and multi-type power, especially with that special Hawlucha move. How could I counter that? What could I do to help Michelle win? How can I secure my own win? Wha—

"**Watch Out!**" Michelle shouted as she skirted around the giant horde of bug pokemon, while I just walked into it. What really caught my attention was that most of the pokemon in the horde were foreign to Hoenn. It was a horde of Beedril, Forretress, and Whirlipede. I couldn't see her, but Rall could tell me where she was Telepathically. The main questions in my mind at this point had to do with if I needed to fight and if I needed Aero's hidden strength.

These pokemon weren't wild. They kept repeating orders to themselves. Even if I couldn't hear their voices, I could tell they were in a formation. The fact that they weren't native to here meant that someone brought them to Hoenn.

But I can't play detective now. Michelle's pokemon wouldn't be able to handle these pokemon. They're too strong, with too much experience. Any one of them could evolve right here and now. Aroma and Dana wouldn't last at all with the poison, rock, and fighting type moves. That left Cuddles, Aero, and Dharma, since Rall was also weak here. Of course, our pokemon were outnumbered 5 to 1, so We would each have to do a horde battle with each of our pokemon, But we had no wave clear. What do we do? What now?

Have I mentioned yet that I hate being the thinker? It gets me distracted really easy, like with just earlier with walking into the horde. Only this time, before drawing a single pokeball, or even calling out to one of them, I got hit by Rollouts and Poison Stings from the hordes. My blood was boiling, and it felt like my skin was being swarmed with more insects. My bones were breaking, and may have been broken completely. Aero and Rall somehow got released, trying to fend off the swarm, but there were too many Rollouts on Aero, and too many Poison Stings on Rall. Cuddles was too afraid to fight, and knew her weaknesses better than anyone, especially her lack of power, and was pulling on Michelle's pant legs to get away. She just stood there, eyes wide, taking in the blood and bruises.

I wanted to tell her to fight. I wanted to tell her to stay and help me up, try to get me away like a friend should. But all that came out of my mouth was "_Run_".

_Then_ she followed her Patrat. _Then_ she listened to me. Then I was left to try and control the battle from where I was. My Kirlia read my mind like she always did. She Psychically released Dharma and set up a network between all of us. "_Thanks Rall. I need you to teleport behind these people and confuse them the best you can. Aero, circle over them and Rock Slide them all. Avoid touching_"

"_I can only maintain this for some time_"

"_My skin feels terrible, but I will do my best_"

"_That's all I need. Dharma, please stay nearby and keep me safe. I can't move_"

"_I got you brother_"

To think that my brother could use human catchphrases made me chuckle a bit, but my ribs hurt, and I could taste blood in my mouth. My head hurt too, a pounding sensation, like a hundred Giga Impacts, and I couldn't feel my right arm. I could still move my left arm, but two fingers didn't work. And Old Royal Butt-hurt decided to show up.

"_Let me in_"

Why should I? All you've done for me is make life difficult.

"_That is for reasons you used to understand. You must trust me_"

Trust. Right. After you barged into my head, gave me killer headaches, and only _now_ you want me to trust you? This is **my** body!

"_It is ours. We do not have much time. You are dying. Give me control for only a short while. You can observe my actions as I have yours. I will submit to you, despite your naïveté. Just let me __**save us**__!_"

I am usually very cautious with decisions. I take my time, and do what I think is logical and acceptable of my standards. All logic gets thrown out the window when you're about to die. Despite Michelle in my head, my dream of meeting Hades at the Pokemon League, and my three pokemon fighting to keep me and themselves safe, I had no choice.

"Do it."


	14. What Did I Do Yesterday?

I woke up to screaming.

Whose it was, I do not know. But it woke me up. I sat up … and coughed up blood. Where am I? What happened?

"_I can answer your questions._"

Great, you again. What the hell happened. Where is everyone?

"_I couldn't fix your body, but I called a friend. It helped. Your female friend is most probably back in Oldale Town by now, or Rustboro City._"

Oh, okay.

… **My Pokemon!** Where are they? Are they alright? What did you do to them?

"_Relax. I may be cold, but I value life in all forms, unless others decide to forsake it with sins. Just trust me._"

Trust again. Why don't you explain why I couldn't see what happened during that swarm.

"_The swarm left once my friend came. They forsake their lives, so they burned._"

BURNED? What did you do to them?

"_You are too weak right now for the details. Just know your friends are alright. The pokemon ones at least._"

Okay then. *_Phew_* thank you. Umm … what should I call you, since I share a head with you and all?

"_You enjoy questions, do you not?_"

More than you know.

"_Well, give me a name then. I will cooperate with you from now on, and help you achieve your goals. But you __**must**__ allow me to achieve mine, or at the least do them for me. The world is broken, and must be fixed._"

Well you are dark. I'll call you Gray from now on, since I cannot put a handle on you. You saved my pokemon, but killed others; you have friends, but won't tell me about any part of your life. And you're just plain dark sometimes.

I think we should stop this, I need to find my pokemon.

"_They should be to your right, in their cages._"

-.-.-

Cages? Oh, right, Old Kin—Gray hates pokeballs. To my right, I found Gray was telling the truth, and Rall, Dharma, and Aero were all asleep and healing in a healing machine. This meant I must have been in a Pokemon Center or a hospital.

"Aero… Rall… Dharma." My voice was cracking and weak. I couldn't manage more than a whisper. I tried to reach for them, but my right arm was in a huge cast, and my left middle and ring fingers had splints. I reached for them with my left anyways, and succeeded in falling out of my hospital bed. Pain racked my spine and chest, and I realized that I had stitches. Yay, I survived surgery, and since health care is free, I don't pay a cent. But where is my other stuff?

"You are probably wondering what happened." I jumped from the ground, only to find my legs in bad shape too, and collapsed once again, more stabbing sensations in my shins and thighs. I really needed to learn some bodily self-control, like those martial artists with their Fighting and Psychic pokemon. There was a nurse at the door, her uniform one of a Pokemon Center. Good sign. She had a clipboard that had a lot of writing on it, and wore a look of masked worry and sympathy. Not a good sign. Even worse, there were two pokemon standing outside the door, a Growlithe and a Lillipup. Terrible sign.

Turns out, I survived a horde of bug pokemon by the skin of my team's teeth, only to end up in police custody for my alter-ego's actions.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Author's note: for people that read my stuff, THANK YOU. I'm going to try being more active with my writings, but may not be consistent. There is more to come, so don't worry if you are worrying. I do *sadly* have a life outside of writing. But that will _**not**_ stop me!


	15. Losing the Crutches

"Let's start with some simple questions. What species are your pokemon."

"Aerodactyl, Kirlia, and Darumaka."

"Alright, what are the stones that two of them are holding."

"I don't quite know. Prof. Birch said that he would try looking into it. All I know is that Aero can evolve for a battle, and then reverts to his original form."

"That doesn't sound realistic, but at least you aren't lying." 

Of course I wasn't lying. The officer had a Whishmer with him, and it was trained to tell truth from lies. Also, in case a 15-year-old, broken boy was a master criminal—what a world, right?—they had me strapped to a polygraph. But I hate lying anyways. Unless absolutely necessary of course, which this case didn't call for … yet.

"Alright, kid, almost done. Do you know what happened on Route 105?"

Great, the question I didn't have the answer for.

_I do. Just let me talk._

Hell no, you would get us arrested with your ideas of justice.

_It is the truth._

Which we can leave out. Partially. I don't want to lose my team, or end up behind bars. I hate cages as much as you do.

Gray remained silent for the rest of the interrogation, and now I could only tell half-truths.

"I was walking towards Mr. Briney's with a friend, and then we ended up in a horde of bug pokemon. Foreign ones. They attacked us, and I got hurt pretty bad, as you can see," I showed him my right cast and left splints. My arms were flesh, casts, and splints. "I tried to fight them off, and told my friend to run, but then I blacked out, and woke up here."

"Nothing else?"

The Whishmur tilted forward to this question. Great, the police actually checked if people left things out. What now?

"No sir, nothing else worth saying. Just that the bugs seemed trained."

The officer jotted that down, along with the rest of what I said, and then helped usher me out of the room. My bag and pokemon were returned to me. I waited until I was back on Route 105 to let them all out, and was showered in hugs and tears. Rall couldn't stop holding my head, Dharma tackled me to the ground more gently than usual, and Aero ended up just flopping down on top of me. They weren't saying anything, just making sure that it was me, and that I was alive. We were back together. And we had a new friend… kind of?

"Did anyone see what happened back in the swarm?"

"_I was fighting, then a bunch of them got fried._" I missed that surprisingly deep voice of Aero's.

"_I was doing the same … but didn't … fry them."_ Dharma was still crying, this time at the thought of death being possible. I would have to talk to him later.

"_I was maintaining the connection until you forced it closed and stood up. Then I got attacked and didn't see anything until the burning._"

"I guess the swarm was too thick then. I really don't know what happened. But I know someone who might. Rall, make the connection again."

With a curious green glow to her horns, the maternal Kirlia did as she was asked. Everyone could hear Gray now, and now I could check for sure that I wasn't crazy.

_Hello._

Yay, not crazy!

My family reacted differently, and on a spectrum. Dharma started balling up and rolling around in fear. Aero let out a huge screech and started barring his teeth at me, or Gray. Rall just stared, eyes wide in what I thought was a mix of awe and fear, her horns a pure black night. Then Gray did one thing I actually approved of: breaking the link. My family returned to normal, and I tried soothing them. I still had a bunch of berries and pokemon food, so it was relief-binge night. We camped out, I made sure they all ate a lot of their dinner, and then found us a tree to sleep underneath, only to remember the attack and back away. Instead, I let the team sleep, returned them all to their pokeballs, and hiked to the nearest Center.

-.-.-.-

That Center happened to be in Petalburg City. I was going to check in for a free room when I ran into someone. Well, I was zombie-walking, and _she_ ran into _me_. We both ended up on our butts, on the ground, and glaring. She was in a barsalino hat, like some painter, and had a trench coat on, with what looked like a dress underneath. I turned my head away in embarrassment, hoping not to see what I wasn't supposed to. She also had an Asian look to her.

"What the heck is with you? Are you blind?" she had a pretty voice, but it was also harsh. She also seemed spoiled. Her neck was coated in necklaces, and she had a ring on every other finger.

"Sorry, I'm trying to get some sleep."

"Sure, just sleep in the middle of the Center, huh. Why not just sleep outdoors, like the other dumb trainers."

Talk about a mouth. It didn't seem to get tired. She went straight from an angry frown to a sadistic smirk, and was about to talk some more. Before my ears started bleeding, I broke in.

"Right, you and what badges?"

That got her blushing. Angrily. By her looks, she was a complete newbie. No travel clothing. No backpack. Nothing that suggested travel and training. Also, she didn't seem to have any items in general, save for what may have been a few capsules in her jacket pocket (I can be observant). "You … you really wanna test that?"

Hook, line, and sinker.

"Come at me, girly."

She didn't like girly, or appearing weak. Just what I needed, justified cash flow.

_I will not take part in this._ Damnit Gray, what do you do to help me in battles. _You will see_. I tried protesting to him, but he just shut up. I wonder if he could stay like that for a while.

We walked in front of the Center, and she decided to call out her pokemon first. "Go, Mona!" Out of her luxuriously decorated Luxury Ball came her pokemon. It was a … a … wait, I didn't know this species! What happened? Maybe now I could use the Pokedex that Prof. Birch gave me. I pulled it out, but then the bratty Asian girl shouted, "Trying to cheat on me? Reveal your pokemon! I wanna see how strong a trainer with badges really is."

Alright. Let's see how I can do without my knowledge of pokemon. It's got a huge green leaf-hat-thing, and looks mostly green, so it must be a grass type. Fire, Rocks, and Birds usually burn, crush, or eat plants, so either Dharma or Aero should do just fine. But the massive amount of blue makes me think of water, which should get rid of fire, so I had to send out Aero. See, I _am_ a logic-thinker!

"Go Aero!" I threw his pokeball into the air, and Aero came soaring out. He perched on the ground, positioned between me and the water-leaf foe. A closer look at the opponent showed that it was kind of like a primate, save for the beak and claws (and of course the designs). If, and I mean _if_ I looked closely, I could probably see fear in its eyes. It looked like a pampered pokemon, moving with a swagger, looking down at everything. Except for Aero, the source of its fear.

But Aero had that same look of fear in his own movements: his wingbeats were too fast, his shrieks too shrill, his guttural talking to me always asking for assurance that I could usually give, but could not. All I could tell him to do was focus on using the move we were trying to do in training. Maybe battle would help him do it, I thought, but I can't be too sure. I can't be sure of anything, it seems—Gray was the only reason I could battle so well in the past. It was like I knew everything.

Aero and Mona, the Aerodactyl and the water-plant pokemon. Let's see if I can really battle by myself.


	16. And Falling Down

"Mona, Water Pulse."

The mysteriously spoiled pokemon made a bit of a face, then said some things that might not be safe for you to know, and lazily sat down in a puddle. Except we were on dry land. The pokemon made the water, and then made pulses through it, by the looks of it through its arms (_Her _arms, the pokemon's voice was definitely feminine).

Aero took to the skies to avoid it, but the pulses got bigger, and bigger, and _bigger_, almost reaching my prehistoric flier. The ground was soaked from the waves, and I had already fallen to my backside from the sudden push. That attack was probably for me as much as for Aero, if not more for me.

He looked ready for an attack, and raring for one. "You really don't like water, huh?" "_Not a bit. Let's rip them apart!_" He snarled right after, and I remembered that Aero was a pokemon of instinct. The bug attack must have made him so desperate to defend me that he went feral, and he may have contributed to that body count. This made my head spin. Aero would do that? What about Rall? Dharma? Myself? Gray seemed to be a part of me, so would I get to that point too, with the right push? "I'd prefer that we didn't get to that point. Let's just knock it out, and leave the other be." Aero seemed a bit angry at this, but kept himself in control, and grudgingly agreed. My first pokemon would not become a murderer today.

"Aero, try to fly above the waves. Use Wing Attack when you can!" thank Arceus that Aero listened to me. He was almost double my height now, and could easily batter me around with his new-found temper, but he did care. That care helped keep this team together, and like a family. He was the stone guardian with a heart, the protector.

But his stone was getting weathered by the waves, and he could get confused at any moment. The Asian trainer saw her advantage, and after a Wing Attack, shouted above the waves, "Rain Dance!"

The leaf-sombrero pokemon stopped vibrating its arms in the pool. The waves stopped, but then it started to rain. I looked at the mystery pokemon, and then looked at Aero. He and I were both equally perplexed. The pokemon was dancing, and also chanting under its breath. Then the small pitter-patter of rain turned into a drizzle, then a downpour, then a **monsoon**. There was too much water, and I couldn't see anything other than Aero and the sombrero. "_You should remember this battle like that. Aero and the Sombrero_." "Yeah, that would be awesome." Despite hating the water, and growling at the sky, and the new hostility, **my** Aerodactyl was still in my giant, stone dinosaur.

So why did he look so dizzy?

"Mona, Water Gun." Not good. Aero wouldn't last too long with the rain _and_ those attacks. "Fly higher and dodge! Don't let it hit you!" That was when I knew something was wrong. He dodged alright, but he flew _downwards_ instead of gaining altitude. Aero landed in a puddle, shook his head a bit, and then punched himself in the face. Worse off, the sombrero pokemon looked like it was recovering from our Wing Attacks.

I didn't want to resort to this. It was meant to be a cheap trainer battle. But I needed to win now. This was my pride on the line. My reliability as a trainer. Proof of my skills as a trainer on the way to Championship, proof of owning 2 badges. I held my totem. I didn't know what to call it still, or Aero's, or Rall's, but I knew that there was something special about all of these stones I found. It made Aero evolve. It would make him do it again. "**Now!**"

The cacoon of light engulfed my dinosaur, and in a flash disappeared. Obsidian coated the ridges of his face, his claws, and his spine. He wasn't dizzy anymore. But he was still weaker, and the sombrero was still getting healthier. We had to win in one shot. Just one shot left.

_Aero, you know what I'm thinking of?_

_I do. But we haven't practiced it enough. I haven't even done it once yet. _

_That's alright. Just remember, there is no better training than actual battle. We don't want to lose today._

_I'll do my best. _

_That is all I could ask for._

Both of us were roaring. Aero's high-pitched screeches were replaced with deep thunder, shaking the very rain coming down. I was just screaming like any pubescent guy would—with a lot of voice cracks. But he charged forward. In a way, I did too, flying with him at ground level, readying for something that we had never succeeded at before. The Asian just smiled and said something. Aero caught the words, and gave them to me.

_Water Pulse_

Waves started coming up from the puddle again, only it was more of an ocean. The sombrero-clad pokemon's body only made a single vibration, but it was enough to make waves that could drown the houses in Foretree City. I got knocked onto my butt constantly, and my nose kept filling with water, but Aero needed me. My dinosaur was faring even worse, taking the brunt of the impact with every wave. Still, he crept closer and closer, his obsidian slicing the waves like Jell-O, but still took damage. His evolution allowed me to feel the pain as well, and I could finally sympathize with pokemon when it came to type disadvantages.

He just had to get a little closer. _We_ just had to get a little bit closer. He crashed through wave after wave, the brine swimming into his mouth, on his face, over his back, causing pain at every point of contact. But he knew pain already. _We _knew pain. We were just barely in range, only a little bit more, but Aero's strength was failing. It's now or never.

_Aerial Ace!_

The water and rain died down rather quickly for powerful weather phenomena, but I was still coughing up water. Aero was on the ground, in my arms, his evolution undone, so when I stroked his snout, no obsidian cut my hand. His eyes were closed, as if he was sleeping.

"Oh god" The Asian girl was freaking out. Her Lombre, the sombrero pokemon, was in the same state. Almost asleep.

"I'm sorry" was all I could say without losing it.

"I'm sorry too" was her reply.

We were right in front of the center.

"Please come to this address when you are done."

Aero didn't give up.

"My name is Mei Jin."

He wanted to win so badly. _I_ wanted to win without _Gray's_ knowledge.

"Please"

He won't trust me again. None of them will

"Forgive me"

We didn't win. But at least she didn't either.


	17. A Family Talk Via Telepathy

Author's Note: I hope the last chapter was of taste. I do have something resembling a life, so these posts will come intermittently. I cannot make any promises on when the next one will be, but will try to make it soon for any readers. Please actually **comment/review** so I can know you are reading. Thank you so much for actually reading this far by the way. I shall continue writing … **now**.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Whoever I used to be, I was not really a stranger to a life of luxury; I just didn't enjoy it too much. Yet here I was, sitting up in what should be the world's softest bed, barely able to stay up because I was sinking in it in pure drowsiness. There was a glass chandelier above me, reflecting—no, refracting light into its seven, bright, pure wavelengths, evenly partitioning the room into rainbow-clad sections. There was furniture, for sure: tables, chairs, couches, benches, and even other things like a TV and some other electronics (all more ornate than anything I have ever seen), but all my eyes rested on was the pokemon healing device. It could house a full team of pokemon, and half of the slots were occupied by my family. There was also a luxury ball present, Mona the Lombre. The only pokeball next to it was my starter, my Aerodactyl, my obelisk, Aero.

Just looking at either pokeball made me feel sick.

I checked to see if they were fully recovered from our journey before _that _battle, and from _that_ battle itself, before pocketing them and walking to breakfast. There was a butler at the door to show me the way. A _butler_, in a really swanky house that belonged to a trainer that was not only a newbie, but also rich, apparently smart, and yet easily angered. That was all my knowledge on Mei Jin so far, other than the fact that she had only her Lombre with her, which must have been her starter.

Arceus, that battle didn't just show me how bad of a trainer I actually was; Gray was right, I can't be good for my pokemon unless he is there. I have to tolerate him, help him, and only then will he help me. To think I actually knew more about pokemon as a newbie! I have to use Gray as a resource now, not as an intrinsic part of myself. But will Gray abide? Will he actually bend to my wishes? Or will he use our body again? I can't doubt that it is ours, he could do things even I can't do, like break telepathic connections. But what about—

My train of thought broke down once I ran into the door the first time. The butler had stopped beside it, all tuxedoed and servile. Around 10 feet tall, the door itself could have been in some ancient ruins; it was covered in glyphs, pictographs, stories. If my pokemon could come out, which I doubted they could, then they would have been in awe of how accurate the images were. One could easily differentiate between species based solely on the illustrations, and could even identify moves. There were pokemon from Hoenn, Kanto, Johto, Sinnoh, Unova, and even some from Kalos. But the best and biggest portions were reserved for the legendary pokemon. Each and every one known or fabled to exist had a place reserved for it. I could go into greater depth, but the door was opening, and behind it was Mei Jin.

The rich, kind, anger-prone, smart, cocky, snobbish, and yet generous Asian girl was dressed in complete contrast to her establishment: baggy sweatpants, a light hoodie, a tee underneath, and what looked like a pink hairband. Shoes weren't allowed in the house *cough _mansion_ cough*, so she was just as barefoot as I was. She was the exact opposite of the Mei Jin I battled: business suit, skirt, serious. This girl wasn't trying hard to be a woman, or to be above others. She just was.

"Come in." were the only words she said with the doors open.

"Soooooo… where are you from?" was what she started with behind closed doors. "I guess from Littleroot Town." "You guess?" "I'm kind of an amnesiac. I don't remember my past before my 15th birthday." "And how old are you right now? You look 12." Great another person who thought I was a child. "I'm still 15."

That stopped her questions for a solid five seconds, replacing them with a look of awe. Then the tide came back in.

"How long have you been training? How'd you get two Gym Badges in that long? Can you help me train? How'd you do the thing where you evolved a pokemon with no evolutions temporarily? Tell me damnit!"

The only bit I was actually paying attention to was the question on training. Would I be a good person for that? I'd probably have to rely on Gray for that, and he'd just try to take my body or something. He was 'sleeping' or something. Maybe I could partially 'wake him up'. "Mei Jin, slow down a bit. Start back at the beginning. I only got like five letters of that."

"Ugh, fine. The beginning. How long have you been training?"

"A solid three months."

"**WHAT?** But that's less time than me!"

"How long have you been training?"

She started blushing for the first time I've seen. Wow, that must have been for a while, because we ended up just awkwardly looking at each other, and she was stuttering her way into an answer. "I've been a trainer for almost a year now."

"Huh. And no badges?"

"None at all. Wait, answer my questions first!"

"Fine then. What was the second one? And the third? And everything to the last one?"

"You're hopeless. How'd you get the badges so fast? How'd you make your pokemon evolve only for a short time?"

"For both of those, I don't really know."

"Hopeless"

"Well, you did ask one more question. Ask again, I didn't catch it the first time."

She blushed again. Wow, when she wasn't business-ey, she was sure blush-ey.

"Um… will you… help me…"

"Yeah, sure. What with?"

"Um… with… you know… training?"

There. The humbling moment. Time to ease her down.

"Alright. I'll do it. It's alright to be embarrassed by it, don't worry. I just need some time with my pokemon to discuss it. They need to be willing to train too."

"Fine then. You can do it here. My room is pokemon friendly."

Come to think of it, her room was spacious. It didn't have any ornate furniture or decorations. In fact, the only stuff in the room was a bed, a nightstand, and a Pokemon Healing Apparatus for 20 teams. There could be tournaments held in this room, or Gym battles. I pulled out my pokeballs, one warm with heat, one lacking, and one slightly lighter than the others. Dharma, Aero, and Rall. Could they trust me yet? Did their healing help them? Did I lose my family over a dumb battle for cash? I couldn't know without talking to them.

I let them out.

Aero flew up to a ridge up high to perch. Rall twirled around and stretched a bit, then sat down. Dharma just rolled around the room, over and over and over again, before crashing into my legs and knocking me down. This drew the others over to look down at me.

"So… how are you guys?"

"_Good, I guess."_ Like any mom, Rall could sass.

"_Hungry. And hungry. Otherwise smokin' chill. You?"_ where did my little brother of a Darumaka get his human lingo? A question for a later date.

Aero was silent for a while. He just looked at me, and I could almost tell what he was feeling. Sadness, anger, and something else. I couldn't tell yet, but it was weighing down on him. He just stared at me. Had I had more time to make sure my family was alright, I would have figured it out and tried to make him feel better, but then Mei Jin asked the obvious question.

"Can you actually understand them?"

"Huh? Oh, yeah. Rall helped me with that. I may have known it before … you know."

"oooOOOoooh that's _coooooOOOOoool._" She drew that out as she was trying to pet Dharma. He got excited from her heat, and then started rolling around again, this time not crashing into either me or her. She then tried to pet Aero, but he shrugged her off. Gently, thank Arceus, but still kind of rudely.

"Hey guys, this is Mei Jin. She's the trainer we battled before."

Cue the Yveltal eyes from everyone. Mei Jin couldn't even move, like someone used Stun Spore on her. It was almost comical, except for the fact that her hand was barely inches away from Aero's snout, and that he could bite it off if he really wanted to. Which I wouldn't hold past him, but still, big no-no.

"She wants us to help her train. She'll probably be travelling with us,"

"Wait, what?"

I ignored her attempt at protest and continued, "and we could get more training ourselves. Also, we could learn from her about as much as she could from us. She could kind of … uh …"

"Fund you guys!" Her stun spore wore off, I guess. She caught on then, my pokemon weren't too fond of her, but were otherwise usually accepting, so she had to do something to balance the … dislike. Funding us was something I didn't think about, and I was running low on cash, so all we could afford was a night of spicy ramen and not too much berry juice. "I could make sure you all are stocked up on gear, and have enough to eat between Pokemarts, and maybe some other stuff." At that, she looked at me with a smile and a nod, as if to say _help me, I'm drowning. Get me out of here._

"Yeah guys, all of that. So whatcha say?"

Rall set up a link between the fam-bam, and we hashed it out a bit. I gave Mai Jin the _wait a minute, telepathic family feud happening_ signal and proceeded.

_I don't like this one._ Came Aero's deep gruff. _She beat us, and she really wants something from us. _

_Our help! We help each other all the time. Why not help others too._ My naïve little brother was still on my side. Thank Arceus.

_But still, she may be a future opponent. Trainer, ask if she is joining the Pokemon League._

Fine, mom, I will.

I got a bit of a mental smack for that, then went to ask her. "Are you going to enter the Pokemon League?"

"What? Hell no! I just want to be able to defend myself. And do something on my own, with my own power."

_Considering that she asked for help, that's a bit hypocritical._ Thought Rall. _But at least she is honest. Lets vote then. _

Since when did pokemon know what democracy was?

_Since you rambled in your sleep. _

I don't ramble in my sleep.

_I do. _Enter Gray, the interrupting pokemon expert and extreme idealist. _I wasn't asleep, by the way. And I only barely approve of this. We just need a constant cash flow source. That is the only reason I agree._

Well, at least you _are_ practical. Alright, lets vote. I say yes. Let's help her out, and let her help us.

_Only because we need food, and because I want revenge on Lombrero the sombrero. _To think Aero could make rude, mean, kiddy names. He really wasn't that old after all. He should be more of a brother than a dad, so I guess _I'm _big papa now, huh?

_I heard that. Vetoed._

Great, I can get vetoed by my pokemon. Yay.

_I'm with brother. That Mona seems cool. A bit too cool, but cool still. And bro likey the chica._

Dharma, where are you getting this lingo?

_I guess you were trying to teach me when we were younger. You just didn't like it. _

I can see why. Rall, your vote decides. Keep the rich, Asian lady, or leave her?

_Keep. Only because you find her pretty. _

I don't find her pretty, not that she isn't. I just still have my head—fine, _heart_—set on Michelle. She ran, and I need to find her, make sure she is safe, strong enough to make it through, maybe see if she likes me yet. We only traveled for a few weeks, but she impacted me more than anything ever has in this new life. I need to at least make sure she is alright.

"What is this conversation turning into?" Mei Jin smirked at me, a grin splayed across her face. It took me a full 15 seconds to find that I was blushing, all from my musings on Rall's comment, and of course Michelle. "Sorry. You're in. They'll help you and Mona, and I'll try to do the same. Just… not too many questions. Everything in my short life is a long story." 

"It's a long road ahead. Maybe you'll tell me along the way."


	18. Really Awesome Bullies

"The first thing to training is actually knowing each other."

Mei Jin just stared at me blankly, her Lombre Mona making the same expression. Both were wearing matching scarves, and were both wearing quite a spoiled look, but otherwise they were both clueless. Both simply asked "How do we do that?" "For a start, we aren't living in your mansion-" "It's a house!" "Right, _house_ anymore. We're camping outside. As a trainer, you should experience at least some hardships with your pokemon, and eventually it will just become normal life for both of you. You should both try to communicate, despite your language gap, and just … you know, _be_ together."

Mei Jin nodded at that. Mona did too, but she butted in with a, "_it's really a mansion. You were right about that" _in her high pitched, warbling voice. Mona could sing, which I didn't notice until recently. While walking on trails, she would warble out a tune, and everyone would do something to it: Rall would enthrall us with her pirouettes and balance, Aero would soar and give out deeper shrieks as a beat, while Dharma jumped to that beat. I guess if we didn't want to battle, we could just make some kind of band to earn money. But that wouldn't work out too well, since Lombre didn't sound as nice without hearing its voice, or at least its _real_ voice. Mei Jin was just as serenaded by her Lombre's tunes as the rest of us, but to her, it was just a repeated _Lombre, Lombre, Lom Lom Breeeeee_ with varying pitches.

"The second thing is to learn Mona's strengths and weaknesses, and to battle alongside her. Battling deepens bonds in general, as long as you are paying attention and helping with the battle from your end." Mona and Mei Jin at least partially understood this concept. They'd pit themselves against Rall and I for training, since Aero and Dharma had disadvantages to Mona. Despite the strength the Lombre showed against Aero and I, Lombre was actually really clumsy, and could only last long if Rain Dance was active, since her Rain Dish helped her heal a lot over time. But otherwise, they were actually more beginner-material than anything. This only embarrassed Aero and I even more: if we didn't have that weakness and cockiness, we would have won for sure. That and Gray's knowledge.

Meals were … interesting. My new companions were used to pure gourmet dishes with professional touches. Out in the wild, we just had berries and some capsule-preserved food, which wasn't anywhere near gourmet. My team and I got a little guilty satisfaction out of watching them squirm at the food going down their throats, but after a few days they adjusted. About 21 days.

I only remember that because I got a call from Hades on my Pokenav.

"Hey bud. Where are you?"

"Hades, is that you? Where are you?! What are you doing?"

"Tell me where you are first."

Map-reading time. Apparently, Mei Jin lived in Rustboro City, so we had to go by ferry to Dewford. We were doing some life-training and battle-training on the beaches outside of the town.

"But why do you need to know?"

"Just tell me, bro."

"Fine. We're on the beaches just outside of Dewford."

"Alright, thanks." He disconnected.

"Who was that?" "Just a friend. He was being weird." I noticed a little speck of something on her face. "Hey, you have a thing on your face." "What, where?" "I got it, let me." I rubbed it off. Except I didn't, it stayed there. In fact, it got bigger. "Are you trying to flirt with me or something? Cuz you're just being weird." "Hah, yeah right." I'm still set on Michelle, so even thinking about Mei Jin in that way made me blush a bit. But that didn't last long, because the speck covered her whole face now. My visage darkened, and Mei Jin just looked up. And she shrieked the loudest shriek I had ever heard.

The shadow covered both of us now, and we were calling out our pokemon: Aero and Rall for me, Mona for her. Whatever the flying pokemon was—and it was definitely a flying pokemon—Dharma wouldn't be able to hit it with anything but Incinerate, and that had a bad range. We jumped back in preparation for battle, and then crashed to the ground with sand all over us.

When we finally got up and got the sand out of our eyes, a Tropius I knew as Brahma was expertly hovering just above the ground, with Hades beaming on his back. "Brahma, I think our friends need a gentle Gust" were his dismounting words. His Tropius gladly obliged, blowing the sand off of all of us.

Smug grin on his face, my veteran friend gave me the biggest hug I've had in ages, and I melted into it. Think Acid Armor, but without losing shape. We ended up on the ground, and laughing, and Mei Jin just stared at us like we were the weirdest looking things she'd ever seen, worse than a Garbador herd. We got up, and I noticed that no one was talking.

Of course! Mei Jin hasn't met Hades yet. Right when I was about to make the best introduction ever, Mei Jin broke the silence with a hot poker. "So… you're the guy that almost beat the Champion." "Oh, right, you were watching. Fan?" "Um, _duh!_ You're Hal Desh, the guy that beat each of the Elite Four with only 2 Pokemon! That's not so easy, you know." "It really wasn't that hard. It just requires training. Who are you again?" "I'm Mei Jin. My daddy owns the Pokeball Factory branch here." "Awesome. Could I get some deals or –"

"**Wait a minute!** You got to the Champion? You beat the Elite Four with 2 pokemon each? You go to the Champion?!" The fact that I'd have to fight my strongest friend to get my goal wasn't the only mind-crushingly scary thing; it was also that he didn't tell me about any of it. Mei Jin knew more about my idol than me, and he was my damn _idol_. Why didn't he tell me?

"Yeah, sorry 'bout that. I can't place calls in the middle of challenges, and had to spend a lot of time in prep. I also didn't want to lose half of my money to the champion, especially after finally getting through Victory Road."

Now Mei Jin was confused, "I'm no expert, but don't you _have_ to give half your cash to the winner of any pokemon battle?"

"Well, Miss Hot-stuff," cue the most visible vermillion blush ever, "there is a way to cheat the system. See, in the official rules, you have to give half of the money that you have _on hand_ to the victor. Before challenging the Elite Four, I spent a lot of my money on items, and then wired the rest of it back home to my brother. He's somehow amazing with money, despite his complete lack in people and pokemon skills." He stared off a bit. Venkatesh, his younger brother, was all the way in Kanto with Hades' family. How long has he been away from home? Has he talked to his family yet?

At least now I don't have to worry about losing money anymore. I can give most of it to Mei Jin before a battle, and then get it back later! How'd I not think of this before? This would take away all my battle reservations!

"That's an amazingly public secret. You could just get a bank account." "Says the chick with the 15 credit cards." "It's only 13 credit cards!" Now I have to butt in. "Guys, enough. Hades, you met Mei Jin. Mei Jin, you met Hades. You both know me. I think we can do some stuff now."

The soon-to-be Champion wore an evil grin. "Alright. Let's do some stuff. How about a wager? I bet 10 grand that you can beat each of Brawley's pokemon with one move." "Hell no! My pokemon aren't ready yet. Also, Brawley could have some dual-types that cancel any strengths I have, like Rall's, or Aero's, or something against Dharma even. I need to make sure I'm ready." My rich companion decided to butt in here. "Is someone too scared? I mean, I could always reimburse you for the cash lost from both the bet _and_ the battle. Don't worry about that." "Actually, money doesn't worry me."

"If that's the case, either battle Brawley, the second Leader in the circuit, or battle me, the guy who basically got you set up as a trainer, and a contender for Championship with about 10 Elite Four worthy teams. That shouldn't be too bad, huh?" "Shut up, you guys." Of course they all gang up on me. "Just 'cuz I don't want to battle doesn't mean I'm weak." Both of my friends decided to go with a synchronized, drawn-out, "Yeah. Riiiiight" and the next thing I knew, I was being shoved in through the Gym doors.

"Since I'm pushing you through, I'll give you a single hint: Brawley has no dual-types." I sighed. Yay, that only left over a hundred possible pokemon from the almost a thousand pokemon. "You are so helpful, Hades. What would I do without you?" Despite my obvious sarcasm, Mei Jin was compelled to chime in "Lose." The new friends bumped fists, and just smiled as I walked into the abyss that was the Dewford Town Gym.

After bruising my whole body tripping over gym equipment (human gyms. Who knew those existed?), Gym trainers, Gym pokemon, and occasionally my _own_ pokemon, I finally reached a bright beacon of a room. Yes, I am afraid of the dark, hence the Kirlia and Darumaka with me. No, I didn't use either of them to cheat.

Time to see if I'd have to try beating my Elite-beating, Championship-worthy, big-brotherly idol or not.


	19. A Gray Disaster

"Let's celebrate this sucker's third badge!"

Hades/Hal Desh, whatever he preferred being called, was buying us all dinner at a nearby restauraunt. Scratch that, more like at the only restaurant in town. Since this is Hoenn, and since Dewford Town is so fond of pokemon, all three of our teams were accommodated for. _And_, since Hades had a different team, I got to meet some new pokemon (Gray already knew everything about them, so I didn't need introductions full introductions): Lara the Lapras, Mero the Charizard, Palmer the Shiftry, and Surya the Luxray.

For Mei Jin's sanity's sake, Hades fitted his pokemon, except for Bhoomi, with pokemon translator collars. Since Mei Jin's dad was a big shareholder in _that_ company, she got to carry six on her person for advertising purposes, and Mona, Rall, Aero, and Dharma ended up with collars as well. I wonder if she has anything else we could use in that bag of hers.

Since Lara and Mona wanted some water to relax in, we decided to dine on the beach. While the Lombre and Lapras relaxed in the water with their food, Rall, Dharma, and most of Hades's team ate together on the sand, Surya with his glittering-gold eyes, Palmer basking in the sun, and Bhoomi taking her food behind her shield to eat (I guess Aegislash have their mouths behind their shields or something). The real show ended up happening in the skies. Aero finally had someone to fly with, and two someones at that. Brahma and Mero finished their food really quick and then proceeded with sky-tag. Aero gave me his best kicked-Growlithe look, and I melted. My prehistoric pokemon was flying with two not-so-prehistoric pokemon, and it was like there was nothing wrong in the world. My pokemon were having fun with other people's pokemon, I was with my friends, my family was relaxed and trusted me again, and Gray was shut up for once. At least, until he started speaking up.

_What's going on? Why are all the pokemon out?_

Well, why not? We're just relaxing and having dinner on the beach. All … 10 of us.

_Shouldn't you be training for that fourth badge? I need that to happen soon. There isn't much time._

Well sure there is. We're not going to die any time soon. Just take in the peace when you can.

_Fool. Absolute fool. Look behind you. Disaster is about to strike._

Gee, you're a pessimist. And how would you know, anyways? You're no psychic.

_Look behind you. Tell me what that means. _

Back outside my head, I turned around. Casually, and saw something beautifully terrifying. It was just standing there, paws deeply burrowed into the sand, tail short, fur pure white, face black with a little crescent-moon-shaped horn rising upwards. No one else noticed it but me. It was completely silent, not even the wind dared rustle its fur into making audible vibrations. And its eyes were solely focused on me.

I turned back around to the paradise in front of me. My Aerodactyl was soaring with my awesome friend's Charizard and Tropius. My Darumaka was rolling around in the sand around my friend's Shiftry, trying to make a tornado. My Kirlia, always doing those little twirls of hers, was dancing around the Luxray, as if to teach him how to dance, and even laughing at his failures. But despite the laughing and twirling, I could see that my mom's horns were shining the brightest black that I have ever seen. A black that was almost nothing at all. Yet she was completely unaware.

_That pokemon bodes disaster, my all-knowing compadre. It means we are in big trouble._

Nothing happened the rest of the day. Rall didn't even notice that her horns changed color. All of them were embodiments of exhaustion, though, so we needed that room at the Pokemon Center. Only problem was, they were booked.

"What do you mean, not enough rooms?" Yeah, I'm not too graceful in the face of disappointment.

"I'm sorry, sir, but we only have a single room available. If all three of you are going to stay the night, I can only suggest that you all bunk together."

Hades was all for the idea. I was apathetic. I'm used to chilling outside with whoever, and in a pile with my pokemon. The only problem was Mei Jin, who was more used to having whole mansions and hotels emptied for her. Worse, bunking with two guys made it awkward for everyone. The only reason she actually decided to vote for the idea was because she didn't want to sleep outside again, and her Collapsible Capsule Tent took _way_ too long to set up, and there was non-Rain-Dance-induced downpour outside. Still awkward, but I basically camped with her the whole way from Rustboro, and Hades stopped being weird about it. "Miss Hot-stuff" disappeared when it came to serious matters, like getting sleep. But it was fine, all of it. Our pokemon were resting in their balls, we all had a place to stay the night, and nothing bad happened, despite the Disaster Pokemon. All was good, and we slept in heavenly peace. Well, I didn't.

-.-.-

I was out on the beach again, only the whole landscape was in shades of grey. My whole body was shaking, every single muscle was twitching uncontrollably, yet I was still standing upright. _That _pokemon was there, looking the same as on the real beach (it was just black, white, and grey after all). It just looked at me. I couldn't take my eyes off of it. Then it started walking towards me, and my body erupted in pain. Each step prompted a new surge of pain, until I was so numbed by the pain that I was astonished at my continued slumber. This dream was wrong. Everything about it was wrong. And I had no control of it.

The pokemon was in front of me now. I finally collapsed onto the ground, the pain too much for me. I actually started bleeding, like there were cuts all over. As a trainer, I got cuts and scrapes all the time, but this was every single cut and scrape I've ever had and ever could have oozing blood at the same time. I couldn't move, not even my eyes. The pokemon padded forward, leaning down to my ear, as if to speak. No sound escaped its mouth, but still its voice permeated the black-and-white world.

_I have been looking for you for quite some time._

All parts of my mind started burning in white fire. I finally let my head fall sideways, only to see a grey version of me also bleeding out on the beach.

Gray, I thought. That's Gray. He's suffering too. The pokemon looked completely calm—hell, borderline _peaceful_—but this world I found both myself and Gray in was slowly turning redder and redder.

At least we had each other.

What am I saying? At least Gray wasn't left out of my suffering.

-.-.-

Author's note: I will refer to the main character in my notes as NoName. But who the person is should be obvious to people that have been through official pokemon media, games, manga, TV, or otherwise.


	20. And I Just Tell Myself

Author's Note: The big 20. The giant 2-0. And I'm not even close to finishing yet. To whoever is still reading, thank you for sticking around for so long. I hope you will stay until the end of the story. I'll try to keep these notes limited to every 10-15 chapters. That may change, but everything about this story changes in my head constantly. Is this how it happened? Should something else occur? Who knows? I'm doing this for fun, but still would like any comments, likes, dislikes, critiques, and whatever in reviews. Please do review. Thanks. Y'all are awesome.

-.-.-.-

Hades left the day after our feast. His Tropius lifted him up off the ground and into the sky. Luckily, Brahma got out over open water before rocketing skyward, so Mei Jin and I didn't end up sand-caked like last time. Still, losing my awesome friend again put me in a bit of a slump, and everyone noticed. That included the wild pokemon, who decided to swarm us.

Mona and Jin ('cuz Mei was her family name, apparently. And I'm way too tired to keep calling her by her full name) were just relaxing together on one of the many, infinitesimal sand islands, while I was battling against a trainer's Wingull. Ancient Power and Rock Slide were helpful, since they gave my Rock-type a useful type-advantage to the Wingull, and we got a fist-full of cash for it. We got to the island since Aero was finally large enough to fly two teenagers'. Of course we can't really fly straight to Slateport, since its illegal without Fly, so short distances had to do. And as to why Aero, Rall was _way_ over-leveled from Brawley's Gym, and Dharma had an innate weakness to the local pokemon with no noticeable advantage. If it weren't for Jin's funding, we'd have run out of items long back, and would need to call someone—probably Hades—to get us out of here. We should have called him anyways, because we were about to get—how would Dharma put it?—wrecked.

Jin was the first to notice the beached Tentacool and Wingull. There were even Pelliper among the pokemon gathering around us. Mona freaked out for a bit, dancing around in her weird way, and then got into a fighting stance—albeit really shaky and Skitty-ish. I didn't get to heal Aero with any items, but quietly called out Rall and Dharma. This was too familiar to the bug pokemon earlier, too similar to when I let Gray take over and cause a massacre. I couldn't let that happen again. He was stirring, but only doing the normal things like giving me info on the gawkers. They looked poised for battle, and were all about ready to attack, but did nothing.

Why weren't they attacking?

The silence was absolute. Even Dharma was quiet, which doesn't even happen in his sleep. Rall was setting up a Telepathic link between the six of us, including Jin and Mona for the first time—so I guess they were officially part of the team then—and we were all just waiting for the H-bomb in front of us to go off. A single grain of sand could have moved and we all would have heard it.

Then Gray had to be completely weird with a _Where's the Absol?_, and the bomb went off.

-.-.-.-

_This person thinks he has complete control of the mind. But he doesn't know how minds work like I do. I'm basically in his subconscious now, and can see and hear anything going on in his head. Regrettably. While I don't want to get stuck with his thoughts on how awkward riding an Aerodactyl with a girl is, and how amazingly new the ocean smell is to him, I can at least enjoy the sights. Wingull gliding lazily through the skies, with Pelliper flying circles around each other. The occaisional Krabby and Tentacool Surfing around the waters. There was even a Frillish looking up through the waves, as if haunting the depths. All of it was purely beautiful, other than the fact that there were still trainers that were imprisoning "their" pokemon. _

_The view was the only thing keeping me from thinking about that dream. I could identify that pokemon—Absol, the Disaster Pokemon, pure Dark-type, usually know a lot of physically strong critically-hitting moves and some psychic ones. _This_ one used Dream Eater on us, so it must have been a trained one. But for it to be in the wild, something must have happened. Was it freed by its trainer? Did it kill its warden? And to top it off, how'd a _land_ pokemon travel across _seas_ to end up in Dewford of all places (yes, I'm learning about Hoenn through his eyes. Knowledge is power)?_

_The worst part was that I heard more than my… um, partner, did. And saw more than even I wanted to._

_The Absol was walking up to us. It looked to be trying to speak, but its voice just barely was heard through the dream realm, like a whisper from across a continent. Luckily, I wasn't feeling as much of the pain from the Dream Eater rejection, so I could hear most of it. There were cries for help, for sanctuary, for asylum, and, most despicable of all, for the future of a trainer. I couldn't tell what this pokemon wanted of another human then, but know I can tell: its human was in danger. Of what, I don't know, which only makes me hate the Absol to the point of fear, but there were tears in the mix. It was crying, although its tears didn't show, and it was begging for someone, anyone, to help. If it visited again, I could easily listen more, but the only message that came across from that desperate plea was as follows: help me, trainer, *sob*, danger, and most cryptic of all, monster. Whatever the monster is, I want to at least document it. _

_So imagine my surprise when, on the horizon of many hills of sand in this giant ocean, I saw that very same Absol hiding behind some island rocks._

-.-.-.-

Jin and Mona knew basic type-matchups, meaning they knew their own disadvantages. That's another lesson out of the way. They also, luckily, knew some of their strengths, which I already knew from our first battle. I also learned that pokemon innately know their advantages, because Aero and Dharma were Rock-Sliding and Rollout-ing all of the bird pokemon, while Rall was Thunderbolt-ing all of the Tentacool. Jin and Mona stuck with Ice Beam and the occasional Leech Seed, but otherwise stayed behind the front lines. Thanks to Rall, we didn't need to talk. We just _thought_ to each other.

We need to get out of here.

No way, really? Gee, I just thought we should let these nice pokemon gorge themselves on us while they can! Jin's sarcasm was a bit too obvious there.

Aero will be tired. We could always go back to Dewford with Rall.

No, her voice echoed in my head, We need to get out of here, and we are **not** going backwards.

_So, just keep moving forward? _Mona's thoughts were more feminine than her voice, and she was almost shrill with those. _Can't we just go home?_, She whined._ I wanna go back to the pond and take a nap. I don't wanna fight anymore._

Mona, this is why we need to get stronger. We aren't a good team yet, and we don't bond at all. That's what we need. Otherwise, mom and dad would be furious at our giving up.

_Look,_ Rall chimed in, _I don't care what the decision is, but make it fast! I can't sustain this __**and**__ fight at the same time._ Hooray, time limits! _No pressure._

_Mama's a hypocrite._ Mutter-thought Dharma mid-roll. Aero just think-grunted in agreement, never stopping his rocky barrage.

Then the one person who shouldn't have ever talked started talking, and I hated Gray more than ever. _Just give me control. Or just go back. We can't go forward without losing someone._ As he talked, the sky started clouding up. There wasn't any lightning, but we could all hear thunder. The wild pokemon were getting more and more agitated, attacking with a greater ferocity. Jin and I wouldn't last any longer, and Gray seemed worse than that Absol he was obsessing about.

Then, for all the lack of lightning, there was finally a bolt, and the connection broke. Along with my brain.

-.-.-.-

Another note: The end is not nigh. Don't worry, if you are. For simplicity's sake, I will call the hero Nammer, because his name will come up _much_ later. I'm working on this pretty hard, and want it to be amazing, so the rest will come in the next chapter.


	21. What a Wonderful World

Author's note: I made this chapter a bit too epic, so sorry for the giant text wall! At least this lives up to my expectations of rando-craziness. Again, I must thank you for reading so far into my story, and must beg, _beg_ you to continue on. I know my writing patterns are erratic at best, but know that I am not perfect. And neither are Nammer and Gray. Anyways, thank you _again_, sorry _again_ for text-wall-ness of this, and I hope you find this as awesome as I think it is. At least partially.

No, I will _not_ make a 21-vine-based joke.

-.-.-.-

Are you okay?

I found myself in the gray world again. Gray wasn't there just yet, but what he called an Absol was. I panicked. Didn't that thing make me hurt last time? Wasn't it trying to eat me or something? Well, I couldn't just wake myself up, so I was stuck with it.

"Hi. What are you doing here?"

I'm trying to talk to you. Why else would I try entering someone else's mind?

"How should I know? And why enter _my_ mind, of all the minds around you? Why do you keep hurting me?"

I'm not trying to hurt you. The only way I can enter people's minds is through the move Dream Eater, and that can hurt for some time. Eventually, your mind will get used to it, and it will not hurt anymore.

"But _why_ are you even here, and why can't you just leave me alone? I already have enough trouble with Gray in here."

You mean the other you? He just left. He is sleeping.

"Well that's taken care of. But why are you here? And why are you hurting me so often." My head was starting to burn, and I could feel blades on my skin, despite nothing being visible.

Again, I do not mean to hurt you. It is simply a necessary evil. I need you to … assist me.

"Why not just talk to me? You know I can understand pokemon, I think."

I do know. I just cannot take any risks. This is the best way.

"It's kind of the _worst_ way for me, and you hurt like a bi—"

Just help me. I do not have much time. I need you, and you are the only one capable of helping.

"Well what do you need? At least give me something to work with." 

My human will soon turn into a monster. I need you to help him.

"Wait, your _human_?"

Yes. I could tell now that the disaster pokemon was getting testy now.

"Why should I help? I don't have any obligation to this person of yours. I don't even know who this person is, or anything about him, or her."

That was when I started bleeding. The Absol cut my stomach open. You **must **help! Its brow was furrowed now, horn glowing a deep black. I did too much to ensure his safety, and now there is nothing more I can do but threaten you. Now **help me save him!**

There was too much blood on the shaded-gray sand, too little in my mind's representation of my body, and also too much anger surrounding the invader, colored in many shades of dark red, like an aura of evil.

**You must help me save him, before it is too late. **

And with that, and a legendary-sized pain in my head and stomach, I opened my eyes.

-.-.-.-

_I woke up to a Wingull trying to rip my stomach open. _

_My pokemon—no, his pokemon—were fighting tooth, nail, and mind to survive. The spoiled brat was crying like a little girl, and her pokemon was almost useless with its lack in the advantage department, along with the bravery department._

_I picked up the Wingull and threw it off. It simply squawked in annoyance and flew back into the melee, Pecking and Water Gunning his pokemon. He just _had_ to have a team that was mostly weak to water, despite how well they were fighting back. I was surprised that they were even alive then; the mass of wild pokemon alone could overwhelm any two people, but the type disadvantage should have sealed his team's fate, along with his own. Maybe he really _does_ deserve his pokemon._

Don't think like that!

_Great, he woke up. Now there isn't much for me to do. Should I call my friend for this? No, it wouldn't appreciate so many infrequent calls without explanation. I'll just leave things to this somehow-alive trainer, and try to solve the formula of the Absol, and why I can still control this body._

-.-.-.-

_The baton is yours. And congratulations on the surprisingly strong team. They have been fighting 20 enemies at a time each. Don't disappoint me._

With that, Gray shut up. From what he said, we were still in a battle royal. I sized up the situation: Aero bleeding from one wing, remaining grounded; Rall resorting to Psychics and Confusions from exhausting Thunderbolts, her horns a bloody red; Dharma, worst of all, was still steamrolling through the Wingull and Pelliper with Rollout, but left a trail of blood behind, oozing into the sand before being lost in the surf. This situation needed salvaging more than anything before.

Time to try not screwing up again.

"Rall, Teleport here and use Lucky Chant! We need all the luck we can get."

With a grunted "_Kirl_", my tiny dancer was next to me again, and was raising her arms and blood-spattered horns to the sky—the horns weren't glowing blood-colored, they were _covered_ in blood—and began chanting just under her breath to the legendary pokemon above.

Aero and Dharma took significantly less damage after that, but were still hurting badly. I returned Rall—she was too angry and scared and in shock to actually listen good, and I didn't want to risk losing her—and tried to return Dharma with no results.

"_I can do this! Just let me."_

"You've lost too much blood. Dharma, get back into your ball, now!"

"_I'm almost done."_

Then I saw the wave in the distance glitter with red gems. More Tentacool were coming. We wouldn't survive another wave of wild pokemon. Why were they even _attacking _us? We didn't try jumping any this whole route. What could have prompted—.

My train of thought was broken when Mona the Lombre collapsed in her own blood, and Mei Jin screamed bloody murder. I threw my Pokenav at her, clipping her shoulder before she could catch it, hoping she knew what to do. She just stared at it for a few seconds, then started calling everyone on the device. I hoped to Arceus, Rayquaza, and Jirachi that Hades was still close enough to help. We needed a cavalry now more than ever.

I couldn't focus enough to make Aero evolve, even though I knew evolution can heal wounds. Dharma was still out, still bleeding, still fighting past exhaustion. He wasn't flinching at anything—which must have been what that whole Inner Focus ability was about—not at his own blood, or the cries of the Wingull he was crushing, or the shrieks of the Pelliper above trying to pelt him with Water Pulses. He was treating this like war, like a battle to the death where he may not survive.

He was fighting like he had fought masses of pokemon to the death before.

Once he was in range, I gave the return command, and my war-prepped brother of a pokemon couldn't do anything about it. Now I could fully focus on Aero. My giant of old was grounded and barely pulling through when he noticed his totem glowing, and gave me a look that said _about friggin' time!_ He turned to face all of the raving pokemon around him and gave a deafening screech, and blinded them all with light of the ancient sun.

We had a link now. I could salvage this. I could save my team. I could save Mei Jin and Mona. Or I could die trying.

_We will not die, trainer._

Not now, we won't. Your wings are healed, right?

_Yes, and they feel much tougher now. So do my jaws and skull. _

Let's use that. Use all contact moves. Biting moves, slashing moves, I don't care, just hit as many as you can with them. I have to make sure Jin and Mona are alright.

_Will do_.

With another godly screech, the wild pokemon were stunned with fear, but still could sense a type advantage, and kept up their assault. Aero dove in with fangs streaked with lightening, biting into as many Tentacool as he could. He alternating with jaws of ice to use on the flying ones.

I ran to Mei Jin, my rich companion who, just a few hours before, dignified me with a laugh for my terrible jokes. She was funding us still, and I had a bunch of item capsules to better store items thanks to her. She used to be so … full of life. Now she was just staring blankly at her pokemon, doing nothing at all—no screaming, no crying, no running, no fighting, nothing at all that she would have done just a day—just a _half hour_—before. Her Lombre's blood was pooling in the sand now, and almost reached her kneeling form. "Return her" I tried telling her. She just looked up at me, empty. "Return her!" I shouted at her. Delicacy could wait, this was an emergency. She didn't hear me though, and just stared.

Aero had tired his two strong biting moves, and now was hitting all of the pokemon with Iron Heads and swings of Dragon Claws. I rummaged through Jin's purse, conscience surely rotting by now, and fished out Mona's pokeball. It was ornately designed, but I could look closely later. I returned the bleeding Lombre, and tried to urge Jin to move. She wouldn't. Nothing I did, from shaking to shoving to rolling, could get her to move herself. I had to pick her up with my nonexistent upper body strength. For the lady she tried to be, she was _heavy_. But things got heavier when Aero and the last pokemon faced off.

He relayed the whole battle I missed back to me in a thought, and then we were of one mind once again. It was the head Pelliper, probably the one that started the attack.

My golem told me that he was hungry.

The Pelliper hit him with a Water Gun. He circled around to Bite the bird's tail, taking out a few feathers and drawing blood. For the first time in my memory, I allowed my pokemon to draw blood.

The battle ensued, and with a loud, shrill dive, with a warcry, the Pelliper Pecked a hole into my pokemon's wing. Aero shrieked, and started falling.

No! Not yet! With our one mind, we tried to fly back up. We tried to make a comeback. But the enemy was too strong for us, and we too weakened by its fallen allies.

I'll feed you when we get out of this, alright?

_Fine_.

Aero hit the sand, and reverted. The link was gone, and so was my usable team, and Aero's evolution, and my hopes at Championship, and Jin's wish for acceptance and competency, and our team's hopes at survival. It all hit the sand.

Jin still in my arms, I fell to my knees. The Pelliper was still coming at us, readying a Water Pulse. Jin had a future in this, at least. She had a family to return to. I didn't. I laid her down, luck having it that she was passed out. At least she wouldn't see what was about to happen.

The huge Pelliper was right in front of me now, mouth gurgling with water. I stood between it and my friend, probably my second friend ever, and grabbed its beak. It won't take away any more from my friends, and will _not_ get away with hurting _my_ team.

I got a Water Pulse to the face.

And then I got struck by lightning.


	22. Welcome to the Beach of Hell

I dreamed of ravenous Wingull.

My pokemon were paralyzed to the point of complete numbness, and could only watch as each of them were Pecked into by the demonic sea birds. They couldn't feel anything, thank Arceus, but they saw everything that was happening to them. And they screamed. Aero wailed in his most bestial screech, drowning out all thought and hoping to deafen the evil, but to no avail. Rall and Dharma were crying, with no hope of survival.

And I was forced to watch.

Like them, I couldn't move, but unlike them, there was an Absol—_the_ Absol—lying on my stomach, yet somehow on the sands of a gray Dewford. There was a look of deep focus on its face, but nothing was happening.

"Save them!" I pleaded. "Save them, kill the Wingull, do whatever you can, but _save them!_"

It just stared at me, red eyes scrutinizing my helpless state. Then it blinked, and we were at the beach.

"Where are they?!" I yelled at it. "Where are my pokemon?!"

_They are in a … Center. You are too. _

"But the Wingull… the paralysis…"

_All concocted by your own imagination. _

I sighed. My team was fine. My family was fine. Everything was _fine_. Right? 

_You have questions?_

"Yeah, why are you still here? Didn't I leave you on Dewford? How'd you cross the ocean?"

_That doesn't matter. What matters is your answer to my plee._

"Plee? You mean your human problem? Well, tell me why I should help you."

_Because you are good._

Yeah, right. I was ready to kill that Pelliper … with my bare hands. What was going through my head?

"You mean, nice? Kind? Awesome? 'Cuz good does not describe me."

_No, you are good. You are also, however, protective. Do not let that die, but do not nurture that part of you._

"What are you, my life counselor?"

_I do not have time for your sarcasm. I need your help, and only you are capable of helping. My tr… human needs you._

"Again, why? Why am I obligated to help this person you care so dearly about?"

With that, my dream body—which sadly still looked like my normal body—got cuts everywhere. And I felt it all a tenth of a second later.

I was rolling on the sand, watching as my blood reddened the gray world. It oozed between grains, and I could only marvel at the detail of the dream. Would I feel this pain when I woke up? How did I make the sand grains so … realistic? Any thought, except for the damned Wingull dream, would suffice to help me forget this pain. But no thoughts came.

Red eyes were looking directly into my eyes yet again, this time with a little purple glow following their movements. The Absol's black horn and crest glowed with the same purple haze, dark, murky, haunting.

_You will listen because I am capable of ripping your mind to pieces at a thought._

-.-.-.-

I woke up to the spray of vomit water. Flowing up my nostrils.

I immediately choked on it, and it went back out the way it came… which was to say, in pure pain and suffering. I ended up coughing for a full three minutes before I could get my bearings.

Then I felt something sharp next to my neck, sharp and kind of curved. First thoughts: _Absol_. Second thoughts: _why do I smell seafood?_ Sure enough, after turning my head, I found a sort of crab gazing into my soul. And then got more vomit water in my face. And up my nostrils again.

Since I wasn't asleep this time, I only sputtered for a few seconds. Then I decided to end things and throw something at the thing. The pokemon was about to pinch me, I just _knew _it, that devious smirk on its face was the same as the one Dharma wore when he was trying to trip Rall—minus the teeth—and I was scrabbling backwards and fishing my pockets. Oh wait, I washed up on a beach. Nothing is in my pockets. I ended up tripping on my backpack while still crab-walking backwards, and the pokemon scuttled onto my chest, evil grin clear as Glalie ice. I needed something to hit it away. The thing had a shell, I had squishy and useless skin, _where is the zipper!_

After finally finding it, the pokemon _snipped_ off the hoodie I was wearing, clearly cutting the sleeves at all the right places for it to fall off smoothly. It even seemed to know that seams were good places to cut, leaving me exposed to the elements, and _cold_.

I scrambled desperately for something, _anything_, in my bag, and pulled out something in my bag. Immediately, I threw it right at the crab's—lobster's?—face … and it disappeared in a flash of red into my only great ball.

No, don't let me catch this monster. I don't want a sadistic monster on my team. Arceus, if you can hear me, please don't let me catch this monster.

For once, Arceus may have been listening, because the pokemon broke out. It then hissed at me, and with a low mutter of _Corphish_, I knew that I didn't wake up from my nightmare; I woke up to it.


	23. The Monster, the Gray, and the Promise

Author's note: Hi again. Yes, my submission frequency is best described as erratic. No, I do not know what you readers think, since there are no reviews of any kind. Please review. Love you all. Thanks.

And yes, Nammer lost his pokemon-voice-thing. Or did he?

-.-.-.-

_I am awake._

_I am aware of my surroundings. There is a Corphish on my body, slowly cutting away at my clothing, and trying to reach the flesh underneath with its small claws. I can hear what it is saying. But I cannot tell my … partner of its language. His friend, the girl, is not with us, but on a different, small, sandy island._

_He just noticed the connection—or rather, the lack of one. He is … what does he call it? Freaking out? Yes, that, he is freaking out now. At least he does not have to entertain this Absol haunting us._

"_What do you want with me, danger-bringer?"_

I want nothing from you, creature. I want the human's assistance.

"_Well, there seems to be a bit of a problem, because _both_ of us are human, _both _in the same body, and _both_ about to die. So unless you can come as our knight in shining armor—fur—_both_ of us shall die to this infinitesimally unimportant water pokemon!"_

That does seem to be a problem. Mostly a you problem, but the human is the one I need, the kinder one. Not you.

"_Again, I must bring up that _I_ am the one conversing with you. Why did you lie about our location?"_

That was to prevent panic.

"_Well, you definitely started more. Also, how are you using Dream Eater when both of us—me and him—are awake? I thought that could only work on the sleeping."_

Dream Eater gave me a doorway. Carving it hurt you, but your minds both adjusted. I am left with a gate to your consciousness, of the one that is not in the body, as of right now.

_He is proud of himself. The smugness of that is almost obvious. But he has a cause to help a human. No wild pokemon with that much pride would wish to help a human. _

_No wild Absol can learn Dream Eater._

"_You were trained"_

_It snarled at me._

"_You were released"_

_It's horn glowed a bright pink. _

"_And you wish to help your trainer."_

_It roared and slashed at the air with what I knew to be a Psycho Cut, and my arm fell off with a spurt of blood. I only have around 3 seconds before the pain makes me dormant again._

"_Help him. If you want his help … you must _**HELP HIM!**_"_

_And I drifted into sleep with the screams of hell._

-.-.-.-

The psycho-pokemon was for sure trying to kill me. My first few clips to the neck only proved that.

It was also trying to maim and cripple me. My arms and legs were coated in small, deep cuts.

Worst of all, it was _playing_, and _laughing_, with little bubbles foaming out of its mouth after every hit it made. This thing, if anything, was trying to make sure that I was in pieces when I died. When … I already gave up then, I guess. I couldn't use any of my pokemon, and didn't have any massive pokemon-fighting skills.

I'm screwed.

Then a Razor Wind cut off my last tatter of a shirt, and left the little Satan-spawn as cut up as I was.

I turned to find the white-and-black pokemon, horn whipped in wind, looking straight at me. It padded over in a manner no different from a Delcatty, and crouched down in a fighting stance, between the evil _thing_ and me.

It came to save me.

I guess it was really serious about helping its person.

With a snarl, it charged forward with a Night Slash, scraping up the belly of the thing's shell. The sadist flew upwards, landing with a painful _smack_ into the sand, but then just stood up, only scratched. The disaster pokemon was shocked, I guess expecting to have won by then, but didn't give up; its horn glowed with a pink light, along with its eyes, and it swung its horn in a downward motion with a loud _Ab-SOL_. The evil-crab-thing looked in confusion, then was smashed down into the sand with a heavy Psycho Cut, its back shell scraped. It moaned out a whining _Corphiss_, and then got back onto its six legs, pincers flailing wildly as it talked to the Absol.

The Absol only let out a brief _sol_ before turning back to face me.

And, for the second time that day, I got hit by lightening.

-.-.-.-

"_Talk to me. Can you hear me? Are you awake?"_

I rubbed my eyes. I was on Dewford again, the gray one, with the gray version of me. If I knew he would be _that _devoted to his new name, I would have done it earlier. Everything about him was the same, albeit gray … except his arm, which was a wavy, pulsing red.

Ask about the arm, or mention the killer pokemon up above us? Decisions decisions.

"I'm fine. Thanks for asking. Just a little cut up about _everywhere_ with not zero, not one, but _two_ murderous pokemon in the real world, for all I know, debating on how to split up my body for dinner!"

"_The Absol is a friend … I think. The main problem is the Corphish. It really seems to hate you, and after—"_

"Did you just say Corphish?"

_That's_ the species of my new nightmare? Wingull couldn't even compare to how this pokemon acted! This … thing was doing to me what the Wingull in my nightmare were!

"_Yes, it is a cute, cuddly, homicidal Corphish. It hates humans, you specifically, and has not only a territory and honor complex, but a full-on hatred complex. You do _not_ want to know how many times it mentioned stuffing your intestines into your mouth before cutting out your heart for you to see_."

"Descriptive. What's happening now? Why can't I see the light leading me to heaven yet?"

" … "

And then there was light.

The Absol was holding the monster—no, the _Corphish_—in the air with a series of Psycho Cuts, which in itself if a feet. Psychic powers are hard to control for non-psychic pokemon, and there have been scandals caused by non-psychics learning TM psychic moves and then going a bit insane. The only thing blinding me of this blatant awesomeness was the conversation the two pokemon were having.

"—_its hair to make my new bed! I shall snap each bone in its body to make it fill up with marrow, and then attract the sharpedo with it as a lure to feast on both of their entrails! It shall be in shreds of pure pink with no organs at all, and those will ALL BE IN MY BELLY!"_

"_Hey, __**shut up!**__" _the Psycho-Cut-cage closed up just enough to make the Corphish's claws stay stuck to its sides. "_I do not care how much you hate humans. I need this one. He can understand us now, so unless you wish to be caught and trained by this piece of filth you so despise, I recommend leaving._" 

"_Captured and trained?" _The Corphish's eyes glittered at this thought. "_Why hasn't this disgustingly profitable venture crossed my mind before? I do care for my little island, but I also wish to have dominance of other beings. This puny human is a key to that, you say?"_

No, I don't want to have a Corphish. Maybe someday I'd be alright with a Corphish, Wingull, or Pelliper, but not _this_ Corphish!

The cage opened just slightly, allowing free motion for the demon-prawn. It waved its pincers in captive joy. Then the Absol did something smart, and for once, helpful.

"_But you may not harm humans in any way after being caught. Trained pokemon do not harm humans, unless ordered to by their trainers, and unless the reason is just. Are you truly willing to do this?"_

"_I will tolerate anything for strength, even if it means protecting this annoyingly-weak human from its obvious lady-troubles."_

Wait, not only would I be getting a demonic Corphish, but a sassy, human-hating, power-hungry, sadistic, _female_ demonic Corphish. No, this had to be a nightmare. I thought Arceus was nice to me for a bit. I thought the Absol was trying to help?

"_Good. Then you shall be captured, Vartuk. And you shall help me make this human help me. I shall free you momentarily."_

And I didn't even get to name it. Hooray for disaster.

The said bringer of disaster used a move to disappear and reappear with an ultraball. Wait, that's my _only_ ultraball! I can't waste it on a demon!

But, without any hand in the matter, the Absol did for me. And I was the proud owner of an evil Corphish.

"_For once, you have caged a being worthy of a cage."_ Were Gray's only words. He was then replaced by the Absol that just ruined my life by making me stronger.

_You must accept that pokemon._

"Yeah, and I should help you, too."

_You must. My human will become a monster if you don't help. Don't let it happen._

"Do I have a choice in the matter?" 

_You have proven that you … suck at making choices. So I have made some for you. You __**will**__ train the Vartuk, you__** will**__ help my trainer, and you __**will**__ help me fix him._

"Fine then. What does this—wait, did you say your trainer!?" 

_Damn._

And with that, the Absol fled from my mind. I opened my eyes to my tattered clothes, bag, new pokemon, waterlogged pokedex, a question of why the Absol lied to me about being in a Pokemon Center, and a white splotch in the darkening sky. Looking back at the ultraball, I could see, or more think, of an image the pokemon left in my mind.

A man, taller than me, with dark hair and a dead Tyrunt. Thanks for that, Absol. Now I have to dig into someone else's nightmares.

-.-.-.-

Author's other note: Gray and Nammer are sorta-separate people now. Vartuk the Corphish is on the team. The Absol basically forced Nammer into helping, and he has an idea how to do so, but what will he dig up in the process?

I'll try to get the next chapter in this week, but I will take a bit of time off of writing next week, because ITS MY BIRTHDAY ON TUESDAY! You don't need to give me anything, but a review of some sort would be nice. I love feedback, just as a person, so think of it as a birthday present to me; a bunch of reviews. Thanks, and have a good one.


	24. We've got Lots of Pain

Author's note: So, that last chapter happened. I'm no professional writer, and would do a lot better with feedback. Yes, this is a call for those heavenly REVIEWS! Please write some for me. Thanks. And on with the fic.

-.-.-.-

That Absol _lied_ about the Center! I was out in the middle of the ocean on one of very many small, insignificant, sandy islands, with only a newly caught pokemon for company, and a team of trustworthily knocked-out pokemon in need of medical attention, and the _Absol_ proved to be the _biggest_ liar of them all! At least the new pokemon was honest about wanting my corpse for pure entertainment. I could let my team out for short amounts of time, but they were out cold, and couldn't even eat or speak, leaving me to just check up on them in shifts (since letting them out of their balls for too long in this state could leave them exposed to attack by more damned Wingull). Also, I couldn't understand pokemon at all anymore—at least, not while awake, since I could when I was with Gray. To make things worse, I couldn't even talk to my pseudo-hateful alter-ego, leaving me to deal with complete boredom.

At least I could train my new teammate. My Corphish, who hours before was trying to disembowel me, was now an … obedient member of the team. The rest of them were out cold, so there was no way to tell how they'd like her, but I guess as long as they didn't know about how we met, they'd be fine. Right? 

I was proven wrong for the umpteenth time when training Vartuk against an isolated Wingull. Vartuk, true to her word, was a _very_ strong pokemon for the area, but I didn't know what moves she knew, or really anything about her. So far, Vice Grip and Crabhammer were moves that Vartuk knew, making it hard for her to attack, but easy to counter attack against the wild pokemon. The Wingull in question only attacked by diving forward to either Peck or grab Vartuk, but my ferocious Corphish knew how to fight back. A Vice Grip to the leg to pin the bird to the ground, and a few Crabhammers to the skull killed the thing.

As a trainer, I don't usually condone killing other pokemon, and I'm usually am a vegetarian. But we were on an island in the middle of the ocean. The only food sources that didn't risk painful death were the Wingull and the occaisional Magikarp that washed up on shore. Desperate times call for desperate measures.

Vartuk could eat just about anything, to my surprise, and was already salivating when I pulled the Wingull to the small fire I had started. There was enough shrubbery to make fires regularly without harming the local ecosystem, but not enough to eat off of, so just using it as fuel was enough for me. Luckily for me, Dharma snored flames out of his nostrils, which usually burned me on normal nights, but could be used this time around to keep those of us that could eat fed. I knew he was an herbivore, so cooked Wingull wouldn't rouse him, but it might rouse Aero awake. I kept a stick of the meat under his snout after releasing him, hoping against hope that he would wake up, but to no avail. My golem and ball of energy wouldn't wake up. I kept Rall out for company—_safer_ company—while munching on the bird. 

Vartuk took most of the Wingull straight down her gullet. Her recent discovery of cooking made meals more enjoyable. At least, I hoped it was the meals, and not the idea of meeting and possible hurting more people once we left the island. With a happy _Cooor _that almost sounded like _Corpse_, she gobbled and gobbled, using her pincers as forks and knives at the same time, picking up some bits of meat and cutting up others. I was enamored by her eating strategy when a thought popped into my head. A thought that wasn't mine.

_I can't move_

I knew that voice, even in my head. _Especially _in my head.

Turning to my psychic, I tried talking to her for the 15th time while on this island. "Rall, can you hear me?"

Nothing physically happened. There was no twitch of the arm, or slight tilt of the head, like in movies I somehow remember. There was just another thought, one of _I hear voices_.

I hugged my little ballerina then and there, stunning a ravenously hungry Vartuk, who immediately morphed into a curious crab-lobster and gently—thank all the Legendaries for that—nudged the Kirlia, to find no results. Cue the judgemental and odd looks from the crustacean. I didn't care about that. I didn't care that I started crying, or that I was eating and hating eating pokemon, or that I was stuck on an island in the middle of the ocean. I was happy that I could talk to my pokemon again.

"Rall…" I said softly between sobs, "It's me. We're stuck on an island … We need to get off."

_Why are you crying?_

My body was racked with another wave of tears, deterring any compassion from Vartuk, and actually making her crawl farther away from me to keep away from the human sappiness. What do I tell one of my team's babies when they ask why they can't move, can't see, and are unable to even eat? She may be the mom, but all of them were like kids to me, despite the team's "brother" and "father".

I stifled my parental instincts and took a moment to quiet myself. I had to be strong for my team. Otherwise, Rall would be constantly worried, Dharma would be crying boiling fluids again, Aero would be angered beyond measure at my own weakness, and Vartuk would never obey me, and may even kill me at some point out of pure disgust. No, I had to be strong, so the tears could wait. I dried my face with the ragged remains of my shirt—it was the only one that was still dry—and calmly explained everything to my Kirlia: the Wingull and Pelliper, Mona and Jin, Aero's last fight, the thunder and Vartuk and the Absol, everything I could remember. Not a single feature changed on her face, no expressions at all while knocked out, so I was shocked at the change occurring in my mind. A probing feeling, like testing the temperature of a pool with a giant thermometer, but all in my head. It tired me, and since I wasn't really tired, I could tell that it was tiring Rall. After the psychic prodding, she could only mutter_… understand… Trainer?_

Be strong. My heart wouldn't be able to take much more of this conversation, but I needed to be strong for my pokemon. I needed to be strong. I _need_ to stay strong. Tears were stinging my eyes again, but I would not let them fall. Not while Rall could feel through my thoughts.

" … I'm sorry … I can't understand … pokemon talking … anymore…" Her horns were glowing, for the first time since she started thinking at me. The color was something that I hadn't seen before, and never of this magnitude. I've seen her horn glow black with fear and dread, red with anger, even golden or yellow with happiness, but never this—this was a deep, sea blue, full of unshed tears.

…_hold…_

Her thoughts were getting weaker. She wouldn't last in this condition. My team would die if this continued, no matter how much I put them in stasis via pokeballs. If my sleeping pokemon wanted something, I had to—_had to_—do it. I first wrapped her in the rags of cloth that used to be my shirt, returned Vartuk, and rested her head on my backpack. All of my possessions for my pokemon. That's how training is; you give all you have to and for each other.

I held her hand. She was too delicate, like a glass flower, to be caressed. The best warmth I could give her was through the makeshift blanket and my hand. I held her as gently as I could, and stifled my tears while I could. I'd give this some time, then return her, so that nothing else could hurt my team. I'd wait marooned on the island until someone passed by, and hope for a chance at a ride to the next city.

Well, those were my hopes. But they were marvelously crushed by a sudden change in scenery. I was still holding Rall's hand, and she still was covered in my rags and resting on my bag, but instead of on the sands of a beach island in the middle of Route 108, we were in front of a Pokemon Center, on the sidewalk between it and the road. People and pokemon around me looked in complete shock at the blood-stained person that had just Teleported in with his unmoving pokemon. I picked my beyond brilliant psychic up in my arms again, hooked my stuff with my foot, and stumbled desperately into the perfection of the Pokemon Center, other trainers making room for the bloody guy.

"My pokemon!" I shouted, "someone help my pokemon!"

Nurses and Chansey and another pink-and-beige pokemon ran out of the back, with stretchers and bags and other medical equipment I can't identify. Rall and I got separate stretchers. They hooked me up to some kind of anesthetic, leaving me woozy _and _tired _and_ scared.

"Mister, what happened to you? What is your name? Do you have anymore pokemon?"

I knew the answer to all of these questions, but all that came out was, "Iwasonanislandstuckwithmynewkillerpokemonandhitbyrightninananan … wa buuuh … mah pookettes stiiil have polkadot bawels … Yai wanna eat somfin soom, I hayet Wingurr."

"You still have them on your person? What species are they?" 

"ummmm …" I knew this question too. I could answer this. But I'm not sounding right. "thereza … Aelopacsill … Dhalumata … and Corpse fiss. Weel dey all … wiff Kirya … bi faiyen?"

"We will do our absolute best with you and your team. Right?"

With a few "Chansey!"s and what I heard as an "Albino", they put a mask on my face. I was falling asleep again. I really hate sleeping now.

At least this beats getting struck by lightening.


	25. Recovery Doesn't Work Part I

"Luckily for you, trainer, you aren't the first person to come in with near-death pokemon." The nurse was sitting beside me, outside of the Pokemon ICU. I kept my hand running between Vartuk's three crests and the end of his shell. She hated it, I know, but I told her that I needed this, and only would do anything of this sort in times of pure desperation. She only agreed because she thought it wouldn't happen that often, or last that long.

Woops, it would.

"We'll start with the easy recovery injuries first," the nurse continued, eyeing me for confirmation. I only nodded. "First off, your Darumaka. He sustained heavy damage from water attacks, which significantly lowered his internal fire's temperature. He will remain under observation for a night to recover, and may have some trouble with fire attacks for the week after his discharge, but he will make a full recovery."

All I heard from that is, "Dharma cannot battle for a week."

"Next is your Kirlia. She has taken a lot of damage from attacks that wouldn't harm her psychic abilities, so physically she should be fine. But the real issue with her is the thunder that struck you while she was in her pokeball. That electricity activated a neural pathway rarely present in psychic-types, and may result in unpredictable behavior from your Kirlia, anywhere from episodes of no psychic power to moments of aggression or depression. As a psychic, her present coma should end just before you can take your Darumaka out of recovery, but the neural pathway is now completely apparent, and cannot be removed without dealing significant mental damage."

The repercussions of this were obvious. Rall wouldn't be able to use her psychic powers sometimes, and could even have a complete personality change at any given moment while awake. My baby would never be the same.

"Now your Aerodactyl," I cringed, knowing he sustained the worst injuries of my fighting three. "His wings were punctured by a Pelliper, which would normally be a non-issue, with only a month of R-and-R required. The real issue is that this Pelliper was one of the few in the area that fed on Tentacool, resulting in some of its poisons remaining on its beak. Those poisons entered your Aerodactyl's bloodstream upon puncture, and depending on the poison, will most definitely cause some physical … and regrettably, permanent, damage to him, although the nature of this toxin cannot be discerned until the affect has manifested, at which point it will be too late. We have already tried to remedy this with many different styles of antidotes and even a few mixtures augmented by Pecha Berries, but the toxin has been in his system too long to be purged or destroyed via simple medicine."

In layman's terms, my starter had some kind toxin in his system, and we wouldn't know what it did until he woke up, and even after that, and after knowing what the poison did, he wouldn't be able to fly for a month.

And they didn't even talk about me yet.

"Now for you." She said with a grimace. "You have made Hoenn Pokemon Center history, which isn't really a good thing. You still have healing ribs from your earlier horde encounter with the bug pokemon, and burns from their deaths. Those will need more time to heal than before, which I predict to be about three more months. You grabbed the Pelliper's beak, which was covered in the aforementioned toxin, and also was, by Pelliper standards, sharp. You will have heavy bruising on your hands because of this, and may at times have episodes of twitching in your hands, mostly in your pinky, ring, and middle fingers. You also suffered from cuts near your jugular, lungs, and heart."

Translation: training just got a hell of a lot harder. Thanks, Pelliper. And a special thanks to my sadistic Corphish.

"We haven't even addressed the main issue, which I cannot say can be recovered from; you were struck by lightening, and not just once, but _twice_. The only people that have survived this kind of excessive electricity are experienced electric trainers, who have lived with this for the majority of their lives, and people wearing electricity-retardant clothing. Since you have neither of these, you will have difficulty with your mind in general, be it in physical control, random and sporadic thoughts, or sensory function. Do you have any psychotic issues that I should know about?"

Why, yes, I have another personality, an alter-ego, but he doesn't ever control my body, and was the main reason I could understand pokemon in the first place. He also may have a hero complex of some sort.

"… No …" came out of my mouth. It was then followed by a drawn out and hoarse, " … what if…?"

"Well, we'll go with the positive aspects that come with this kind of … treatment." She paused on that word. I remembered that electrotherapy was a thing, and that it did sometimes work on psychiatric patients. "For things like depression, bipolar disorder and its variants, obsessive-compulsive disorder, multiply personality disorder, and sometimes even things like schizophrenia and PTSD, the symptoms would lessen, and would only be present in states of unconsciousness or incredible duress. Sadly, as a trainer, there will be a lot of duress in your life, so should you suffer from any of these, I seriously recommend an immediate halt to your training."

The look on my face said it all, so she simple left to retrieve my pokeballs and had an Audino aid—that's what the beige-and-pink, blue-eyed pokemon was—guide me to my room. By guide, I mean basically act as a giant, fuzzy, soft, huggable crutch that basically dragged my weight. I thanked it when we reached my door, and hugged it for a bit. Audino loved to be hugged, so it was the best payment I could give for its services.

-.-.-.-

_I can see everything. I can hear everything. But I cannot _do _anything. _

_His pokemon are all crippled, and there is nothing I can do. _

_We were struck by lightening, and there was nothing I could do._

_We almost died—not once, but _twice!_—and there was nothing I could do._

_The only thing I did do was massacre a horde of bug pokemon. It is the only thing I wish I didn't have to do._

_He believes me a cold-blooded killer. Let him. He doesn't matter. What matters is what the Absol told me before. _

_Before he joined in to see his new teammate. _

_-.-.-.-_

"_You want me to do what?"_

_You should understand my motives here. He, while all that I need, has faults like any creation. He does not wish to help anyone aside from his friends and his team. That can be a problem when it comes to my issue._

"_Still, even if I was capable of—"_

_I know you are capable of this. You summoned the legend and made it break its ideals for the truth you so believe. You controlled a god with nothing but thoughts. This is what I need of you, only on him._

"_You broke our connection, in case you didn't notice! I cannot communicate with him, much less manipulate, let alone take control!"_

_You should be able to eventually. Just think of this as … a safety measure. Yes, insurance. I need my trainer to be fixed, and I need your … _host_ … to fix him. There is a hole in his soul, and many things can fit in._

"_So others can fix your trainer?"_

_Yes._

"_Then why did you ask him for help? Why not some other person?"_

_Because the piece that you both provide is the only good one._

"_Well, your _idiotic_ Thunderbolts may have destroyed that, since_ I CAN'T TALK TO HIM AT ALL!_"_

_His horn glowed again, this time with a darkness that sucked in all light of the gray world, like a black hole in space. He snarled in visible silence, and I could feel blood leaving my colorless body. I dared not look down. Looking down meant I acknowledge the existence of the injury. I will not look down._

_I will not look down …_

_I will not …_

_There is blood at the Absol's feet._

_I collapse in a specter of color and gray, and the bearer of disaster padded forward, resting a paw covered in the stench of ghosts on the side of my skull, as if contemplating whether my soul would be a fine addition to its list of creatures feasted upon. It only muttered a single thing to me before letting me sink into my own entrails and pain, voice laced with the rage of deities._

Then talk to him. Or you shall not ever again.

-.-.-.-

My team of four was on a healing machine in my hospital room. I had a hospital gown on, and my stuff was in a sterilized hospital bag. I was supposed to be getting hospital rest and hospital care. Well, I did get both of those hospital things, but I was busy in my hospital-patient mind thinking of ways to salvage the situation.

Aero's been permanently poisoned, and maybe crippled.

Rall has been for sure crippled, mentally and psychologically.

Dharma has been temporarily crippled.

And then Vartuk kind of … caused the crippling, albeit unintentionally.

The real cause was the Absol.

Gray noticed it, and that thought may have prompted the attack that destroyed my will.

Jin and Mona were somewhere I wasn't so I didn't have any partners any more.

Hades was off doing Champion-tier things.

And for all my talk, here I was, being hospitalized in a hospital.

I chuckled.

Then I started laughing. The laughing evolved into a really loud laughing, and then I ended up cackling manically, and then the Audino assigned to me rushed into the room to check if everything was alright. Apparently, cackling after getting electrocuted may not have been a good sign, so I just made the cross-species "All clear" sign—while cackling. The Audino relaxed a bit, its little things hanging off of its ears uncurling a bit, and the furry creature took my hand in its paws, purring gentle tones. I relaxed, and sadly stopped laughing. I like laughter.

My team was crippled, my friends were legendaries-know-where, and I couldn't laugh. Now all I had left were tears.

But none would come.

The Audino decided to be the best thing in creation when it saw my tear-free crying face, and walked—more like a cute waddled—to the healing machine, and proceeded to dump the pokeballs and ultraball onto my lap. I ruffled my hair and hugged it in thanks, and took out my team into a nice and warm sleeping pile on the bed. My ribs could wait to heal a bit more. Before my team actually woke up to face their own problems, I wanted to make them—and, to be honest, myself—as comfortable as possible before venturing into the torturous realm of Yveltal. I made us into our usual pile +1. I wrapped myself around Rall and Dharma, got Aero to wrap himself around us, and then had the spiteful Vartuk allow herself to get wrapped in. I heard a half mutter, half hiss of a _fiiisss_, and then did the emergency shell-pet for good measure to send the message. She listened and let herself get stuck between the dinosaur and the human, albeit unwillingly and uncomfortably, and dozed off.

A thought popped into my head before I also dozed off. Something from a religious text, like on of the legendary cult ones, but not one that was common in Hoenn, that's for sure.

… _and from the light came truth and morality … truth searing into the sky, sea, and land as only fire could … and with the bidding of the master, assaulted morality with flames of justice … and in sleep, both remain._


End file.
